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1.50 Downgrader for 2.50/2.60 PSPs Released 127

Posted by Zonk from the now-you-can-play-real-games-on-the-psp dept.
Cyraan writes "PSP owners rejoice! Hot on the heels of the recent exploit discovery & bricking that resulted from early test versions comes a confirmed working downgrader. The method uses a GTA eLoader that will turn any version 2.50/2.60 PSP, with the exception of those with a TA-082 motherboard (how to check without opening/voiding warranty), into a version 1.50 capable of playing all forms of homebrew. One thing that may not be mentioned specifically in the article: it is recommended you NOT use the 32mb Memory Stick that came with the PSP, as the process creates alot of log files that can fill it up, possibly causing a brick."
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1.50 Downgrader for 2.50/2.60 PSPs Released More

1.50 Downgrader for 2.50/2.60 PSPs Released

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  • IT IS "A LOT". This makes me seriously fucking angry.

    • Re:ALOT IS NOT A FUCKING WORD (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Overreacting much? [imageshack.us]
    • Woah..... Forget your meds this morning? There's alot more in this world to get upset about that using a word that might not be a word.

    • Re:ALOT IS NOT A FUCKING WORD (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      "A lot" is a subdivided piece of land.
    • Who sez, bro? American ain't no legislatived lingo, ya knows? Irregardless of whats you'se ole biddys thank.

      Gots ta go!
    • You have my support. Fuck everyone who contributes to the downfall of my language.

  • And the quest (Score:5, Funny)

    by buffer-overflowed ( 588867 ) on Saturday July 01, 2006 @04:40PM (#15643442) Journal
    to play Nintendo games on Sony hardware continues...

    Join us next month for the release of 2.7 with Loco Roco, and the following month for yet another crack.

    • Re:And the quest (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Actually, the ISO is out and runs just fine on 1.50 using devhook 0.41d.

  • Amazing... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by kinocho ( 978177 ) on Saturday July 01, 2006 @04:46PM (#15643466)
    It just amazes me, but I have no idea wich one the most...

    Stupid companies stopping customers to do what they want with legally owned hardware or

    People buying a piece of drm'ed shit that will, by all means, try to prevent it's logical uses and full potential.

    (ok, not exactly drm, but you know what I mean...)

    What, do they thing that we only have rights to the usage of the machine now? Play with it, but don't "play" with it, the new motto...

    (fuck them all)

    • Re:Amazing... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Aim Here ( 765712 ) on Saturday July 01, 2006 @05:03PM (#15643514)
      What do you mean 'not exactly DRM'? What you have is a machine that is allegely yours but won't run binaries that you wish to run, merely those that someone else wishes you to run.

      That IS exactly DRM.

      Otherwise, yes.
      • No, that is not DRM. DRM is short for "Digital Rights Management", the "rights" mentioned is "copy right". The point of DRM is to ensure that you can't use material you have bought in ways the copy right owner doesn't want you to.

        Now you could extend DRM to mean "run unauthorized programs" but that's not really the norm. That's what "trusted computing" and all that crap is about.

        • Re:Amazing... (Score:2, Insightful)

          by zzatz ( 965857 )
          "...in ways the copy right owner doesn't want you to."

          The right that you're talking about doesn't exist. The copyright (one word) holder has control over publishing copies and public performance, and that's it. Any owner of a legal copy may USE his copy in any other way, with those two exceptions.

          DRM is often attached to material which is also copyrighted, but the 'rights' being managed are rights that don't exist in copyright law.
          • If the "rights" claimed by DRM is correct or not is besides the point. The point of DRM is to give the copyright owner more control than they usually have.
            • No. You still don't get it. DRM is orthogonal to copyright.

              DRM restricts the rights of the owner of something. That something may be copyrighted, or it might not be. The restriction may be imposed by the copyright holder, or it may be imposed by someone else. DRM does not enforce copyright, it imposes restrictions unconnected to copyright. Copyright deals with publication or public performance, neither of which are restricted by DRM.

              When I buy a book at my local bookstore, I own that copy. It is mine
              • Ok I see what you're saying now.

                However, the main difference is that I was talking about DRM from the producers pow and you are talking about it from the consumers point of view. Naturally shoplifting is independant of copyright. It has to do with material goods, copyright OTOH conserns itself with immaterial rights.

                Personally I'd argue that without copyright (and the copyright/intellectual property thinking that goes with it) we wouldn't have DRM. The would be no point. You could also argue that DRM is not
        • No, DRM is short for "Digital Restrictions Management", and that's exactly what the PSP is doing here. It's digital, it's restriting you. DRM.
          • So are non-root user accounts on Linux DRM as well?
            • The difference is that if you own the Linux box, you can do anything. User accounts are something you use to limit the ability of others to hose your computer.

              Sony's DRM limits the ability for you to use your own property. (Unless you're just renting the PSP, in which case Sony can do whatever they want. Of course, you could sue them for breach of contract if they said you could do something that you can't. If you don't like the PSP's DRM, though, why not just not buy one!? Let Sony go out of business.)
          • No [wikipedia.org].

            Some (Stallman) call it "Restriction Management" but those people are the minority.
      • So, should we start pushing dev info be released publicly for all major systems?
        I'm sure sony would love to know if people out there would be interested in deving for the PS3...

    • Re:Amazing... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by KDR_11k ( 778916 )
      What most people want to do with the system is to make it run illegally downloaded games, most of them meant for other systems and many still being made and sold by their rightsholders. This hacking is also contraproductive since it makes sure there is no real market for a handheld without these restrictions since people just buy a PSP and crack it.
      • I wouldn't qualify that with "most". MOST of us(ok, I'm not one, I refuse to buy anything by Sony at this stage of the game) actually like playing with hardware and making it do things it wasn't originally designed to do. MAKE magazine is a shining example of this attitude.
      • What most people want to do with the system is to make it run illegally downloaded games, most of them meant for other systems and many still being made and sold by their rightsholders.

        Kind of like emulators for PCs. So should Windows try and keep me from running Snes9x?
        • No but Windows wasn't sold at a loss with the plan to make up for it with game license fees so MS doesn't care what you do on it. Sony does care because it prevents their PSP from being profitable. If the PSP was sold at a price that makes a good profit for Sony it would be ~300-400$. But it isn't and that's why it's only slightly more expensive than the much cheaper to build DS.
          • Selling at a loss is Sony's fault. People want to do home brew stuff. They should be able to do home brew stuff -- they bought the hardware.

            Now that it's been made clear Sony is going to make it a bastard to have homebrew games/etc, I imagine people who want to do said thing won't buy a PSP. They'll buy a GP2X (or whatever it's called).

            Just because you run NES games on your PSP doesn't mean you're not buying PSP games. Watch Sony make it so that new games won't run on 1.5 anymore, if they haven't already. T
            • The thing is, the trouble you get with running homebrew is included in the price, the alternatives where homebrew is encouraged are more expensive and many people are going the cheap route and subsequently complaining that they don't get the ease of using homebrew the pricier products offer.

              AFAIK the Sony game division did make money in the past but Nintendo's strategy of "profit everywhere" resulted in Nintendo having twice SCE's profits. Of course I expect Nintendo is still selling stuff cheaper than they
              • I'm not saying Sony's never made a profit, never meant to imply that, I just meant over the last two or so years; I get that some of that is the PS3 R&D (and soon, I imagine, hype and ad campaigns).

                I think the main reason homebrewers are buying the PSP is because of the popularity; I hadn't even heard about the GP2X outside of a mention in Wired until recently, and then only on Slashdot or from the guy I know who bought a PSP primarily to run old system emulators on. The PSP is capable, and it's out the

      • Re:Amazing... (Score:3, Informative)

        by ExKoopaTroopa ( 671002 )
        But some of us actually enjoy expanding this cool little device with things like audio/video streaming (PSPRadio,Pimpstreamer), using the psp a universal remote (iR Shell, iTunesremote, PSPVNC), reading other media file formats than those allowed by Sony (PMP Mod, PSP Media Player). Check the full list here : http://psp-homebrew.eu/listall.php?filter=category [psp-homebrew.eu]
        Oh and we still purchase games for it too (but no way am I buying a UMD movie ...)

    • Re:Amazing... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Jawbreaker4Fs ( 974108 ) on Saturday July 01, 2006 @05:14PM (#15643548)
      Just buy a gp2x and be done with it.
      • I'm selling my ipod to get one of these. A few reasons why:
        1: Cool factor. No one else around here will have one
        2: Its open and runs linux, +1 cool factor
        3: The only thing I do with my ipod is plug my head phone adapter into my stereo in my car.. this will do the same
        4: It will do more than my ipod with less hacking and costs less.
        • Oh, and for those too lazy to google: http://www.gp2x.com/ [gp2x.com]
          This isn't the site I originally remember, but its the same device.

          • Software for the GP2X (Score:5, Informative)

            by Rob Simpson ( 533360 ) on Saturday July 01, 2006 @06:20PM (#15643732)
            Anyone interested in what software is available for the GP2X should look here: http://www.gp32x.com/ [gp32x.com]

            There are plenty of emulators, freeware games and utilities. There is also stuff for the previous-generation GP32.

            • Seems a bit lame TBH... No proper games and the FAQ shows it to be woefully underpowered:

              mp3:

              "The GP32 can play many MP3s as long as they are renamed to 8.3 characters,"
              "bitrate is limited to around 128/192 kbps"
              "No VBR support"

              divx:
              2 available..
              moviepark: "supports 10 frames per second"
              GPDivX "no sound"

              Plus a read of the emulator support reveals them to be buggy, slow and incomplete... certainly none are release quality yet.

              TBH I'll look again in a couple of years when they have a product worth buying.
              • GP32 != GP2X One is a 133mhz arm w/ 8mb of ram. The other has 2x200mhz arm, 64mb of ram and a hardware video decoder.

              • Re:Software for the GP2X (Score:5, Informative)

                by Rob Simpson ( 533360 ) on Sunday July 02, 2006 @02:22AM (#15644797)
                You're looking in the GP32 (the previous model) section. The GP2X has superior (and built-in) mp3 and video support, is much faster - it has two processors, each of which is twice as fast as the old model's CPU. My GP32 can play Phantasy Star 4 (Sega Genesis) and a bunch of Turbographix games flawlessly, among other things. Apparently the GP2X has excellent emulators for Genesis/TG16/SNES, though can't say for sure since I haven't received my GP2X yet. :) But since it has considerably better hardware, it seems reasonable. The only emulation that is supposed to be buggy and slow on the GP2X seems to be PSX (because of the 3D) and DOS emulation.
                • SquidgeSNES doesn't quite hit fullspeed yet, but it's close enough that many games are playable. I've clocked 20+ hours in Dragon Quest V alone on it, and Actraiser plays nicely as well.

                  Depending on the game, YMMV. Don't miss gpfce (NES emu) either.
      • Do you know where can I buy gp2x in California (SF Bay Area)? I am searching for real shop, not online purchase.
    • Features added by a downgrade...brilliant!! Brilliant!!

  • Downgrader? A better word! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by erroneus ( 253617 ) on Saturday July 01, 2006 @05:18PM (#15643554) Homepage
    Backdater. Downgrade seems like you're making something worse which is actually the case with some "updates" that are provided by some makers. Examples of this includes TiVo updates that remove features like commercial skipping. It would most certainly not be an upgrade. And to go back to something with better features once removed or modified would not be a downgrade. But to go back to a previous version that is more useful in some way, I would call "backdating." (please, no gay jokes)
    • The PSP OS is undergoing a transformation to a previous version, even if it wasn't originally installed, the PSP community should stick with established computing jargon. The PSP has a motherboard, video display, cpu, input devices, memory for temporary and long-term storage and an OS that is updated periodically. Smells like a computer to me.

    • 1.5 Didn't have the web browser that the later versions have. There are some other things too, like I think Sony added an RSS readers.

      In this case, it is a downgrade.

      • Not really. DEVHOOK makes it almost trivial to use the 2.0/2.5 firmware features from 1.5, and only adds maybe 10 seconds to the time it takes to get things up and going.

        Going back to 1.5 doesn't mean you lose all those features anymore.
    • That'd be true if 1.5 had more features than later versions. It doesn't. The only 'feature' is has over the others is the glitch/bug/exploit that allows unsigned code to be easily executed. It has no browser, to streaming video, etc etc. This is a downgrader in every sense of the word.
      • True, but now we have the wonder of devhook, and pretty much seamless 2.50 emulation on 1.50, and 2.60 isnt far behind now. Though I can agree that downgrade isnt the most accurate term, it seems to be the most widely used.
    • No.

      Down grade.

      Other than the lack of homebrew, Sony does introduce things into the firmware that make the thing more useful.
  • Just went to newsgoups(a.b.sony.psp) got the dutch version of the downgrader. Translated directions with bablefish and it works perfectly on my Lik-Sang Japanese import(white version was 2.6 firmware, now 1.5). Total time less than 5 minutes.
  • How many ways are there to "brick" this device?

  • Personally (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Bongo Bill ( 853669 ) on Saturday July 01, 2006 @06:00PM (#15643668) Homepage
    I'm waiting for that modchip to be released. That or an exploit that doesn't involve owning GTA.
    • The mod chip costs more money and doesnt add many new features. Sure if you have a previously bricked psp that you are going to revitalise with the mod chip, go ahead, but then again you can buy a 2.5/2.6/2.01 psp on ebay for less.

      Also interesting to note is that recently sony/rockster have been releasing a patched version of GTA that stops the edison carter exploit, so buy second hand ;)

      • So what should minors whose parents approve of homebrew but not of car theft simulations do? And what should people who live in countries where GTA has been banned do?

        Answer: Nintendo DS homebrew. It's my aunt's choice for her kids. Seriously.

        • Or buy a GP2x [gp2x.com]. Although the DS is better if you want to play current games rather than just use it for emulation/homebrew.

  • Slashdot Duped by the QJ Network (Score:5, Informative)

    by Croakyvoice ( 986312 ) on Saturday July 01, 2006 @06:39PM (#15643783)
    The person who submitted this article carefully linked to the PSPUpdates/qjnet spam machine which charges it uses 3 dollars a week to view the forums with no ads, on the newsposts them selves they have not linked to the real coders sites or indeed release threads. This network have been banned from digg for these actions of spamming and well i hope slashdot do too. If your looking for better PSP News Sites that actually link properly then check out these sites: PSP News - http://psp-news.dcemu.co.uk/ [dcemu.co.uk] PSP 3D - http://psp3d.com/ [psp3d.com] PSP Hacks.com - http://www.psp-hacks.com/ [psp-hacks.com]
    • I can see what you mean about the links to the coders individual sites (I had not noticed that before). The summary I submitted thanked & credited the coders involved, but that part seems to have been removed. However, there was nothing "carefully selected" about the links, I used PSP Updates because they're one of the larger sites covering the story/PSP scene in general, I don't have any affiliation with them, and if ads bother you so much [mozdev.org].
  • One thing that may not be mentioned specifically in the article: it is recommended you NOT use the 32mb Memory Stick that came with the PSP, as the process creates alot of log files that can fill it up, possibly causing a brick.

    How on earth could they code an update process that fills up an 32 MB Flash? A Firmware itself is about 18 Megs + a Loader (3 MB), a program (~5 MB), how on earth can you write a log file that grows on 5 Megabyte?
    Writing a bit for every byte going to the flash-rom? They could writ

    • Re:Filling up 32 MB??? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Firehawke ( 50498 ) on Sunday July 02, 2006 @01:25AM (#15644689) Journal
      Note that the program was on beta 5-- the previous four test versions bricked PSPs, period. They were outputting a whole lot of debug data about each stage of the flash, it seems, since there are some complex steps to get things to the right point. It's not just writing bytes-- this downgrader apparently actually borrows chunks from the official PSP updater and does some interesting tricks to bypass various protection mechanisms.

      The logs were there purely to figure out where things went wrong; nobody expected this version to work.
  • I noticed on the site that Digg seems to be banning QJ.net links from making it to the front page. Does anyone here know why this is?
  • ..but unfortunately for those who own the newer revision of the PSP, the TA-082, we're left high and dry unable to run homebrew the same way 1.5 users are able to. I am one of the unlucky few, having seen at least 200 people pass through Fanjita's IRC channels successfully downdating their PSPs.

  • So glad I got rid of my PSP (Score:4, Interesting)

    by British ( 51765 ) <british1500@gmail.com> on Saturday July 01, 2006 @09:49PM (#15644223) Homepage Journal
    I went out and bought specificially a 1.5 to enjoy the homebrew. I ended up playing the homebrew stuff more than the pricey games.

    But looking at the downgrader instructions and such, AND knowing the risks of "bricking" your $250 game system, I'm glad I traded it in for a DS.

    While the PSP may have a bunch of fun features, getting to the homebrew stuff with Sony's anti-blessing is just a hassle. A lot of the homebrew stuff is about as fun as recompiling a linux kernel..on a video game system. I won't try to make any Linux technobabble / PSP technobabble comparisons since I've heard nothing but good things about the GamePark.

    So if you like fighting against Sony, the complications of Linux(upgrading/downgrading/copying files), the risk of malware(bricking your PSP, ie worse than any Windows malware), pricey games, and a failing media format(UMD), the PSP is for you!

  • I don't own a PSP nor am I going to get one but any day Sony and anyone associated with Sony gets
    burned is a good day. All the same: Kudos and honest appreciation to the people that hacked the
    firmware.

    I hope this latest fiasco should be cause for people to pull out of Sony and make them drop out of
    the console market altogether. And doesn't it suck to be one of the software vendors that actually
    invested in the PSP2... Hope you're reading this, because this is going to cost you dearly and
    I hope you don't even
  • There should be a song: 50 Ways to Brick Your Sony.
  • I just wanted to say how really weird it is to actually know quite a bit about the topic (I've been developing PSP homebrew for over a year now) of an article and then read how unnuanced and uninformed people's comments are. It makes me wonder about the quality of information and comments on all the articles I read each day.

    For almost every person pointing out something that seems completely stupid and illogical, there is usually a really good reason. Like the person talking about the 32MB sticks bein
  • What the heck can it be doing to fill 32 MB with log files? Does it write it all down in 1s and 0s?

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