Has your PlayStation four been acting funny recently? Well, the problem may not be any of the actual guts of your gaming station, but what’s inside of them: and that may be roaches.
In an interview with the gaming website Kotaku, Patrick Che of Manhattan-based XCubicle, a console repair shop, told the blog that the pests, who are fond of dark, warm places, love the inside of Playstations.
Unlike their German counterparts, the American cockroach will live outdoors (in warmer climates), and in places like Florida, they can be found around garbage, in trees, and in woodpiles. During periods of heavy rains, this species is known to “mass migrate,” and overrun a building. So your PlayStation would make the perfect refuge for a cockroach fleeing a destructive rainstorm.
To begin with, the console’s large ventilation grates at the bottom, whose function is to keep the insides cool while it’s turned on, make it easy for the roaches to enter. It also helps the pests that people usually lay their consoles close to the ground in entertainment centers. And the PlayStation runs hotter than the Xbox thanks to its internal power supply, so it’s warm and comfortable inside for your local roach.
Che told Kotaku that the problem is so pervasive that his store is being swamped in garbage bags of dead roaches when fixing a Playstation, and they even offer a discounted de-roaching fee of twenty-five dollars to clean infested machines. Not only is the pest problem disgusting, but it can also damage your console into uselessness.
Another console repairman said most people don’t even realize their console is full of roaches. “The PS4’s internal power supply fries roaches onto its components, which can stop the PS4 from turning on,” Kotaku notes, which requires a power supply replacement (and a good scrub)
There are ways to prevent this though, and an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. To begin with, keep your house clean and tidy to discourage entrance by the garbage loving scavengers, and also keep your gaming console in an open area with a good flow of air and high off of the ground.
