Earlier in the week Sony released the much awaited v2.40 firmware update for the PlayStation 3. While some gamers have installed the update and are living happily ever after, others got into a spot of bother when trying to install it. Sony has since pulled the update from its servers.

Reports began to trickle through just hours after the update was released. There was a whole range of problems with crashed consoles, black screens and frozen games being just a few. Posts on the PlayStation forums show that the problems are affecting various different models rather than one specific type and Sony has taken the update offline until the problems are solved.

However, while PlayStation forums and game websites across the internet are buzzing with the news of the firmware glitches (the thread on the forums alone is 81 pages long), Sony seems to be trying to play down the problems as much as possible.

In the official PS3 blog Patrick Seybold, Director of Corporate Communications and Social Media said, “As has been reported on many gaming blogs and websites, we have temporarily taken Firmware v2.40 offline. We’ve received a limited number of calls from consumers experiencing an issue with installing the system software update on their PS3."

"While our consumer services department has seen a low volume of calls on this topic, we are committed to providing the PS3 community with XMB access features delivered in the v2.40 update," Seybold continued. "We are working diligently to isolate the problem for those few consumers and to identify a solution before we put the firmware back up.”

So far there is no news on when the firmware will be back up and running but Manager of Social Media at Sony, Jeff Rubenstein, has said the company hasn’t received any complaints from users having trouble after the update has been successfully installed.

So, what can you do to fix your crashed PS3? Well, the answer is, unfortunately, not much for now. There is no news from Sony about what’s causing the problem or how to fix it and many gamers are saying the only way out is to reformat your hard drive. However, to do so would mean losing all your saved games. Backing up your hard drive is an option however many users say their console is completely dead, the only sign of life being a flashing red light. We’ll bring you more on this once Sony release details of the glitch and information on how it’s going to assist customers who have been affected.

The PS3 firmware update v2.40 included the long awaited in-game XMB, which allows users to access menus and settings during game play. Aside from XMB it also included the addition of Trophies, and similar to the PSP update released last month, Google Searching.