Help Desk

PSLS Help Desk – PS4 Error Code CE-34788-0 Fix

We missed last week’s PlayStation LifeStyle Help Desk after being away at Bungie checking out Rise of Iron, but we’re back hitting the ground running this week. Speaking of Rise of Iron, today’s Help Desk comes from an issue that recently gave me a lot of frustration, so I thought I would pass along my knowledge to help other PS4 owners avoid the same problems I ran across.

As my wife tried to update Destiny to the latest version, she found that she was out of space on her PS4. That’s what happens when you have the likes of Dragon Age: Inquisition, The Witcher 3, and Fallout 4, each with all of the expansions installed on your hard drive. It’s been a persistent problem for a while, but we finally decided to upgrade her to a 2TB drive. Midway through the process, when trying to reinstall the system software, we ran into PS4 error code CE-34788-0, preventing us from finishing the process. 

This Help Desk is not about upgrading the PS4 hard drive. We’ve previously covered that topic on PlayStation LifeStyle, which you can read here. This is about the potential error that crops up during the reinstall process. 

What is Error Code CE-34788-0?

Error code CE-34788-0 comes up when trying to access the firmware update on a USB drive. It will appear if the firmware update on the drive is the incorrect one. Most often, this error seems to crop up when people are initializing their system after a hard drive replacement, telling the user that the replacement firmware version is not the right one. 

In my case, the PS4 was telling me to have PS4 version 4.00 on a USB drive, and although I definitely had the latest PS4 version on my USB drive, I continued to get the error code repeatedly. 

How to Fix PS4 Error Code CE-34788-0

If you are just updating your PS4 to the next version of the firmware, you can easily download the update from the PlayStation site here. This is where I was getting the update file from, but the PS4 wasn’t taking it, and continued to give me error code CE-34788-0. The issue is that when replacing the hard drive, you will need to completely reinstall the PS4 firmware, not just update to the latest version, which requires a different file. 

Near the bottom of the page on PlayStation’s site where you can download the latest firmware (linked above), there is a section header titled “Perform a New Installation of the System Software.” There is a very small link in this subsection to download the full PS4 firmware, rather than the update. If in doubt about which file you have, check the file sizes. The update will be closer to 300MB while the full install will have a file size around 800MB. With this correct file, the error code shouldn’t appear the next time you attempt to install the firmware. 

Things to Note

  • Make sure that your USB drive is formatted to FAT32 or exFAT, or the PS4 will not recognize it.
  • To identify the update and the folders, the file path should be PS4 > UPDATE > PS4UPDATE.PUP  
  • Capitalization and proper spelling of the above file path is important so that the PS4 can locate the update file.
  • Make sure that you are using only the latest update file, downloaded directly from the PlayStation site. It can be either the full install or just the update, depending on your needs, but it must be the latest firmware to guarantee proper functionality. 

Have you run into this error code when replacing your hard drive? What do you want to see in the next Help Desk? Let us know via the comments or email us!

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