Its available now. Its installing now. I cant wait to see how it looks.

I watched the video preview and it seems pretty "meh", and not worthy of me jumping out of my computer chair, running down stairs and downloading it. I was hoping for a complete overhaul of the XMB. Just feels too "Dev-tooly" and not user friendly enough.

Installed it. I dont like the new look of the friends list, but I do like the little message and online friends notifyer thing in the corner. I dont like how there are weird animated sparkles in my background now.

I'm kind of meh on it, but I havent taken the time to see what all the new stuff is yet.

I dunno. After installing it, I couldnt sign in. I had it going for almost a 1/2 hour, and it wouldnt sign in. I have to see if it will work this morning. Maybe it was a temporary hiccup or something.

So far I think I like it. I like the new default background, and actually replaced my Bioshock theme with it. I like the bigger text too. The new friends listing is kind of weird with the big gray blocks. Overall, I like it. Some things will take some getting used to, but in the end its all hopefully one step forward.

Still waiting for that voice chat though...

Edit:

So I watched the video on it to see if I missed anything, and the guy was talking about how in the coming months there will be more avatars available. It got me thinking...these avatars are pretty lame. The 360 and Wii have customizable avatars, which can be created to represent you as an individual. Instead the PS3 only offers pre-rendered pictures that are mostly video game related.

Aside from voice chat, I would like to see some kind of customized avatar, but from what was being said in the video, I dont think Sony has any such plans.

well the ps3 offers Home, which was suppose to be what EVERYbody uses when they get on their PS3 but it's not as huge as they hoped, so now they're being forced to go back towards the 360 route.

Home is a complete waste of Sony's resources. It offered nothing that I found interesting at all, and I will never step foot in it again.

Edit:

Hmmm, Ive been experiencing some problems, and I dont know if its my PS3 or has something to do with the firmware. I was playing 50 Cent this morning, and in the middle of the game the screen just went black, and the controller was unresponsive, even though the light was still on. I had to do a hard reset (push power button on console.)

Then my friend and I were just playing Sacred 2 and the same thing happened. My character was still on his screen, and I could still talk to him via voice chat, but my screen was black and my controller unresponsive.

I really, REALLY hope this has something to do with a minor hiccup in 3.0, and is not my PS3's dying breaths...

Are you using HDMI for your TV connection? Or something else?

Do you have Audio coming through your TV or a sound receiver? Does sound continue even though your screen is blank?

No HDMI or anything fancy like that. Sound did not continue on the TV, though the chat worked.

I know that the update allowed for some changes in the way audio is sent out of the system. (like sending audio out through HDMI AND optical) I wonder if there is a setting enabled that you arent using that might be making it more likely for your video feed to cut out unexpectedly.

Where you using voice chat in both instances?

Keep track of what you were doing if it happens again. Each time it happens its a clue about what is going wrong.

You might google PS3 firmware 3.0 problems and see if other people are having the same problem.

Sorry to double post, but also, have you done the Fan check thing where it runs the cooling fans on maximum speed for several seconds? You might have dust buildup inside that is causing it to overheat. The fan thing can help clear it out.

1. TURN OFF POWER FROM BACK OF CONSOLE
2. HOLD THE EJECT BUTTON AND TURN ON POWER
3. YOU SHOULD HEAR LOUD FAN NOISE FOR A COUPLE OF SECONDS
4. THE POWER LIGHT WILL TURN RED AND THE CONSOLE WILL BEEP
5. TURN POWER OFF
6. TURN POWER ON AND YOU ARE DONE

Yeah, I'll give it a cleaning in a little bit. It could very well be that.

Some guy on the PS3 forums mentioned that the same thing happened to him, and if you wait 4-5 minutes it will be ok. It seems to happen during load scenes.

I love the audio multi-out -- that's LONG overdue. (Or at least I'll love it if it works; I haven't tried it yet.) And the new status bar thing in the upper right is an improvement, though it could be a lot better. But the friends list has been radically uglified, and everything else is bleh at best, and some of the stuff, like the super-enormous and annoying advertising, sucks. This is a major full integer update? What the heck was Sony smoking?

Yeah, Im not happy with all the crazy ads either. Before the XMD always started at the game disc selection, but now it starts at that Whats New thing. And yeah, the game disc selection is there as well, but you are bombarded by ads as you try and get to it. The other thing I didnt like was that every section has a PSN store link. Its just silly...it was fine where it was, when it was just the one.

I havent had any other problems with the black screen, so Im gonna say it was as Blake said, and just needed a little dusting.

Least you don't have to pay per month/year to see those Ads like on some consoles...