Sony PSP 1.50 Swap Trick

Negroiso writes "It appears that the folks over at PSP-DEV have created a swap trick for your PSP 1.50 to play your homebrew applications. It requires two memory sticks to use. Please read the included tutorial on how to use the exploit properly." Here is the PSP 1.50 Exploit as well as website mirrors.

knock knock!

Who's there?

Sony and the DMCA.. HAHA HA HAHAHAHA... *blank stare*

-Sj53

#psp-dev on efnet for discussion on hack

There has been a lot of chatter this morning about the hack and how to use it effectively. Check out #psp-dev on efnet.

I got it to play Doom III

I stuck a paperclip down the slot and shorted the damn thing out. The levels are particularly dark, but the load times are now instantaneous. I just can't seem to get the PSP to do anything else which is a bit of a downside.

Re:I got it to play Doom III

Sounds like you need to install the flashlight hack. Just tape a flashlight to the back of your PSP and you're ready to rock!

Article Text

Update: Many people seem disappointed that it's a swap hack. Personally I don't have any problem with it as it works great. We at PSP Hacks give our thanks to the PSP-Dev team for discovering and providing this exploit. For those who are having difficulty getting it to work, follow these simple steps:
1. Download any homebrew app/game
2. Load up the MSwap Tool
3. Select the EBOOT.PBP you wish to use
4. Select an Output directory
5. Click "Generate files"
6. You're now left with two directories - MS1 and MS2
7. Copy the EBOOT.PBP from the MS1 directory to your first memory stick (MS) - X:\PSP\GAME\
8. Remove the first MS and insert the second
9. Copy the EBOOT.PBP from the MS2 directory into X:\PSP\GAME\"
10. Remove MS2 and insert MS1
11. Go to the Game menu on your PSP and select Memory Stick
12. Select the PSP-Dev Launcher
13. The moment PSP logo screen comes on, swap memory sticks
14. Vola! You're playing homebrew on your 1.50 PSP!

Re:Article Text

To make things a bit easier, I've found that you only need to create the MS1 stick once. That is, once you have the special EBOOT.PBP on the first memory stick, you don't need to recreate it every time you change the EBOOT.PBP on MS2. Obviously, the file on MS1 will report the wrong name, but whatever is on MS2 still boots. Tested with the PCEngine, GB emulator and the SNES emulator.

Good news!... Kinda.

I was really excited about this, until I read that it's a swaploit... some people are having it work no problem, but some people are having troubles getting it to load, having corrupted data on their mem sticks, etc.

However I have to take my hat off for the guys that worked this out. Let's hope everyone in the PSP hacking scene keeps up the good work, because I'd love to play some old classics on my PSP.

Also cheers to the poster for putting mirrors in the post. :)

Re:Good news!... Kinda.

I was really excited about this, until I read that it's a swaploit

So you got excited over the "Sony PSP 1.50" part of the title, took a short rest then got all down after you'd chugged through the last couple of words?

It's kind of worrying though th

1.50 Only

Just a note, this hack only works on the firmware version 1.50, which shipped with the PSPs. Sony has since released two updates, 1.51 and 1.52, and the hack does not work on either.

I'm guessing Sony is going to repeat what they're doing in Japan with the version 1 firmware homebrew hack: make new legit games check and force the firmware updates.

Look to the Xbox.

If I learned anything from the Xbox, it is that once there is even the slightest soft-mod, no matter how hacky and contrived it is and even if it just supports one or two versions of the console, as time goes on, it will become less hacky, more user-friendly, and support more versions. There is currently a soft-mod for the Xbox that is in every way as good as a modchip. It supports all versions of the Xbox, it is easy to install, it is easy to uninstall, and it even has a toggle for putting the Xbox into and out of a modded state, so you can go on Xbox Live.

What I am trying to say is that if there is even a tiny little crack that allows for soft-modding a PSP, people will push and push until the mod is so easy to install and so full featured, that your PSP will effectively be able to run any binaries you wish, with no hassle.

It will take allot of time though. A word of wisdom: if the Xbox drops in price to $99 or cheaper, buy at least one. It will be worth it even if there isn't a single official Xbox game you care to play. The homebrew software makes the Xbox a must own, IMO. The media players and emulators alone make it worth $99.

Waste of effort

It is amazing. The programmers at Sony are wasting their time to prevent other programmers to program for PSP and the PSP programmers waste their time trying to hack the PSP.

This is stupid. All that creativity could be used for some cool apps. /picz

Re:Waste of effort

No, you should ignore the platform entirely because Sony is (collectively) one giant asshole. Spend your time making cool apps for an open platform instead.

Which platform?

Spend your time making cool apps for an open platform instead.

Which open handheld platform with decent game controls is sold at retail in the United States?

Swap memory sticks?

This seems highly inconvienant.. I'm not going to play the swap-trick on a car trip or on the bus, it just seems impractical.

Nice work on finding this flaw though, but.. I'll wait until something else comes out that will let me run a homebrew app off of the same memory stick on 1.5*

Note also that Sony will probably be requiring firmware updates with future games, so unless you want to dedicate your PSP to homebrew, you're kinda outta luck until a non-'swaploit' comes out.

We got to find a way to control the firmware on the PSP before much is accomplished.. Reflashing to 1.00 on US units would make homebrew a reality, but then there is the game firmware update issue. To solve this, maybe someone could create a 'grub'/'lilo' type system that could boot firmware 1.00 or 1.5+.

Freaking *Y&(*& GREAT !@

I bought a PSP, the DAY they hit the store, for no other reason than to hack into a websurfer for the couch, and for Pseudo PDA type handheld web based dev.
I have waited PATIENTLY for an exploit and began to loose interest, other than using the Wipeout Pure trick to surf the web.
I got so discouraged I let my kids play with it, 8 and 13 and it promptly got knocked off a table by my wife screen breaking,

Last night, (YUP Last Night) I took it apart to try and figure out an alternative screen interface for it, and TODAY This exploit is announced, while mine is in about 10k pieces.....GREAT .......day late and a dollar short...

Clarification

A lot of you have complained and complained and complained. Lets not forget that although this is a swap trick, it is however a step in the right direction. To clarify some things that a lot of you are missing

THIS ONLY WORKS WITH 1.50 PSP'S ONLY!!!
NO EXCEPTIONS, no 1.51 no 1.52

Another thing, on your 2nd memory card it will be reported as "corrupted data" for this exploit to work. There is nothing wrong with the file that's on the 2nd Memory Stick. All of this is listed on the developer's site or in the "tutorial" in the archived files.

Please for the love of bob, give these guys props. I haven't seen any of you guys that are whining give anything to the psp scene besides "we want we want we want". It is being worked on and the hardware will be hacked. As everything else goes this will take a while it's not going to happen over night.

I personally would like to thank all those involved in this release. It sets the grounds for future exploits 1.5x. . ect.

Please READ before posting and saying something doesn't work or you think it sucks for whatever reason.

The point is they worked around it so mission successful.

In other news... New Windows Hack!!

I was able to hack my WinXP box to run linux by using a second hard drive. It was actually quite easy.

1. Pull out the hard drive with WinXP (you should probably do this with the power off, but it's more fun with the power on)

2. Plug in a fresh new hard drive

3. Put in your Fedora install CDs and follow the prompts

4. Play homebrew linux apps on your hacked box (Profit!)

The best part is that if you ever need to use WinXP again, all you need to do is turn it off and swap the hard drives.

I realize this is merely a swap hack, but it's a start. Someday, I hope to be able to make it so I don't need to be pulling hard drives, but that could take til like 1995. We'll see

A perfect use for memory stick select?

Remember those memory stick select [amazon.com] sticks? They basically shove two separate memory sticks into a single package, and add a small switch that lets you choose which one to use.

This actually sounds like the one case where that might be preferable to having a regular memory stick.

Re:Homebrew?

TROLL! Commercial games taken from UMDs --> WILL NOT WORK WITH THIS! --

Programs like pspChess, and SNES emulator, etc. will work.

(Edit:
Slashdot requires you to wait 2 minutes between each successful posting of a comment to allow everyone a fair chance

Re:Come on...

Actually, I have no interest in running pirated UMD images. By the time you copy the iso to a Memeory Stick that holds anywhere from 180 megs to 1.8 GB, you should've just spent the $40 for the game.

No, I'm excited for PSP hacks so I can run emulators, h

Re:Homebrew?

Actually, at this point, it is still impossible to play pirated PSP games off the memory stick. This swap trick will only work with homebrew apps and emulators, as they are in .PBP format. All the UMD dumps that have surfaced are in .iso format.

It is a st

Re:Homebrew?

No pirate applications? Darn, I was [puzzlepirates.com] really [atari.com] hoping [bethsoft.com]...

Forgive the horrible humor.

Re:What does this thing do?

It turns it into a Nintendo DS.

Re:In other news..

Um. Welcome to last week - 1.51 and 1.52 already do this, and I believe they're already mandatory for some of the latest Japanese releases, though I could be wrong on that.

Re: just make master keys...

Shit, I better go turn myself in, I just replaced my spark plugs. On my own.