8.1 – WHY SHOULD I BACK UP MY PS3? *
Short answer: Because any destructable object that exists in only one place is dust in the wind (thank you Kerry Livgren).
Long answer: Your PS3’s hard disk could crash, or your PS3 could be lost or stolen, or you could make a mistake and have to restore an old saved game… In any of these cases, having a backup of your PS3 data will prove highly valuable.
8.2 – WHAT GETS BACKED UP WHEN I BACK UP THE PS3? *
Here’s what gets backed up, if they exist:
- All installed games/patches
- PS1 software memory cards
- PS2 software memory cards
- PS3 saved games
- All media files that are **not** protected by DRM
- All system settings
Here’s what does _not_ get backed up, if they exist:
- The PS3 firmware (which is unnecessary to backup)
- All media files that are protected by DRM
- GNU/Linux partitions
8.3 – WHAT DO I NEED TO HAVE TO PERFORM A BACKUP? *
You need a USB storage device, such as a thumb drive. Alternately, if you have a PS3 that has card readers, you may use a Compact Flash, Memory Stick, or SD card, to perform the backup. If you don’t have a PS3 that has card readers, then USB card readers will also work.
Whatever media type you use, the media must be formatted using the FAT32 (sometimes also called “MS-DOS”) file system. The PS3 does not support the NTFS (used by Windows 2000/XP/Vista), HFS+ (used by Mac OS X), or EXT3 (used by GNU/Linux) file systems.
That does not mean that you can’t use your Windows USB thumb drive to back up your PS3. All it means is you can’t reformat your USB thumb drive using a file system other than FAT32 and expect it to work in the PS3. Normally you don’t need to worry about this, because most devices out there use FAT32 by default. One notable exception is the Apple iPod, which uses HFS+ by default if paired with a computer running Mac OS X.
8.4 – WHY CAN’T I MAKE A PARTITION LARGER THAN 32 GB? *
For some reason, Windows XP and Vista only allow a maximum of 32 GB for each FAT partition. If you need anything larger than that, then you’ll need to make the partition using Mac OS X or GNU/Linux, both of which do not have this limitation.
