PS3---you sure got a strange way of signalling a firmware update..

Ya know!
Some of the most infuriating things that occur on a regular basis to me these days is when a piece of technology, or a machine that I've grown to depend on, stop functioning for no apparent rhyme or reason. And, so it was with the Sony PS3 player. It's not that I have time to play games. We got the game console because it was the most affordable way to get a BlueRay disc player.

So, we're minding our own business, trying to watch a movie, and because we bought a high def monitor (before the law required they had to be tv recievers--it doesn't have an hdmi in...just a pc in, which we use a hdmi converter plug, so we can get the video from the PS3 to the high def Samsung monitor---a monster of a screen, as big as a typcial kitchen table.) In order to get audio, in full surround sound glory, we plugged an optical audio chord from the PS3 into our Sony receiver. And, it was working great! Then.....it stopped working great.

After fooling around with setting, and swapping chords, and searching-via Google of course- for any messages online from other PS3 users, I suggested to my husband that he once again check for a firmware update. See, he had already downloaded an update.
Well, wouldn't you know it? It needed another one.
And, the audio, magically came back.

Why oh why did Sony set up the PS3 to have technical difficulties when a firmware update is needed? Why aren't we "sent" the message some other way? And, if they were going to make the audio pooping out or the video going crappy the default signal that a firmware improvement needed to be downloaded, why wasn't this made abundantly clear to the PS3/blueray disc viewer in the first place!