If you are out of warranty, take it apart. The worst thing that could happen if you follow a video tutorial is lose one of the small parts...which should be easy to replace.
If you are in warranty, I still don't recommend shipping it to Sony because you won't have it back for quite some time. People say not to open up the PS3 yourself because "itz two danejerus!!1@!" when it actually is really simple. Just remove some screws, unplug some cables, lift some parts gently and you are looking at the disc.