Will we ever be able to mod the PSP?
 

Will we be able to bypass Sony's countermeasures and backup games?
What do you think?

Is the media the games run on even dvd based? I guess it sounds about right considering the size and the 1.8 gigs that fit on it.. You'd probably need a compact mod package to fit in that little booger though..

So you would have to physically mod it?
If I was to guess the UMD's are just mini DVD's similar to ones you buy from Walmart except with a casing around it to help prevent copying.
It would be great if you could slide the mini DVD's you buy into one of these cases and then use it in the PSP's.
All the UMD's are are mini DVDs in a casing.

Yea.. good point.. someone will come up with something i'm sure.. where there's a will there's a way.. Possibly when they get released in the US

i know i would be importing one straight away.

Well, they're a lot more costly importing. Once they're local a lot more people will be able to afford them and start tweaking them..

Also I don't think there would be but in case there are any hardware software modifications for the US versions, the modding community would want to know and incorporate them into their modding efforts.

The Jap versions are NTSC region free so that probably won't be an issue.. I'd love to support the forums and import one from Lik Sang but its just not in my budget.

No, I mean I would buy a UMD blank cartridge from overseas if they were unavaliable here.
I would love to be able to write my movies and music to mini DVD's and then use them in the UMD.

I will be waiting until PSP's are released in Aus. before buying one (who knows when that will be?).
Too big a premium to justify importing one from Japan.
Also you may get screwed if Sony decide to region encode their games.
I know commercial movies on UMD are.

Also, was at the shops today and saw writable mini DVD-R's which are 1.8GB and the same size as the discs inside the UMDs.
I think it is just a easy way for Sony to prevent copying.

I also found out that the PSP uses a standard DVD laser so the UMDs are definately just small DVD's in a case.

Someone will probably manufacture a UMD case with a removable disc so you can burn to the 1.8gb dvds and insert them into the UMD housing..

Backing them up though would be trickier considering I doubt the Discs are removeable for the cases. A UMD reader perhaps?...

I'm just whistling dixie here..

Well I know that when I get my PSP I am going to remove one of the discs from the casing and chuck it in my computer and try to make a backup of it and burn it to a mini dvd then insert it into the UMD case and try to play it.

It just might work.
The hardest part will be dismantling the UMD so I can get the disc out and then put it back in.
But it must be done.

And maybe you wont need a modchip to play these games.

I guess the UMD I take apart will be a movie like spiderman 2.

discovered hole in my theory.
groove in burners are 80mm so the 60mm discs wont fit.
hmmm.....

How about loading a hack onto Memory Stick and connect the PSP via USB to the PC so it'll read the disc off to the HDD?

Only problem is, I doubt that Sony will release the rights for media manufacturers to produce the blank UMD discs... :(

What about some laptop burners that have the snap on hub? ;)



Tyler!

I thought about that too.. But the media would still be 60mm.. (taking davids word for it) and the media sold in stores is 80mm.. So it wouldn't fit in any jerry rigged UMD case.. I thought about the memory stick hack and you'd have to shell out some cash for a 2gb stick.. Unless you compressed the hell out of a game somehow.. That and you'd have to swap all the data out just to play each of your backups when you wanted to.

It would not be too hard to get the game on the computer by doing it a way similar to that of the xbox backups.
I have seen both 60mm discs and 80mm discs for sale in Big W.
I know you need firmware upgrade to be able to read and write to the 60mm discs.
Problem is that not many people have the hardware to burn 60mm discs.

Are minidiscs the same size on the indside?
What if you took a minidisc out of its cartridge, replaced it with the UMD disc and then hack the minidisc recorder to write games and movies from the computer instead of music.

Problems?

In addition, software and data can be downloaded through a USB or wireless network onto Memory Stick PRO Duo. All of these features can be enjoyed on one single system. This is from the game stores uk homepage and i was wondering if u could use Memory stick pro because it clearly shows a memory stick pro slot on the console on the homepage put ure games/movies/video onto the memory stic and insert into psp and play! i think your minidisc theory would also work

Yes, MS PRO would indeed work. It's a Pro stick which ships with the Value Pack :)

how about UMD rewriteables? You will need a UMD burner for PC. For this to work u better hope Sony UMD's will be popular. Secondly how about loading backups straight from the Memory stick.

Yeah, playing games off a memory stick would work but you would need a 2gb stick for some games and they're VERY expensive.

I hope the UMD becomes popular so we can buy a burner.
All that would be however is a standard 60mm burner with a moved laser that would line up with the hole on the UMD.
Not that amazing to make.

Also, the PSP only takes DUO cards.

You'll still have to hope Sony releases the production rights on the UMD - which I read isn't gonna happen - so I think the old UMD-Rw is dead in the water unfortunately :(

i thought the psp disks were like the gamecubes huh anyways yea if i get the psp it will only be for music,movies,and if i can emulators and roms i figure it will be possible noting that u can get memory sticks and upload stuff to that and then play themu probably can back up a game to a memory stick if u get a big enough 1

Talking about mods and region coding. You think there'll be a region hacking patch in the future?

Well, the games are already region free. Who'd want to buy a UMD movie when they can only be viewed on a PSP and are the same cost as a regular DVD Video?

My frined's dad works for Sony and he brought him 2 import's from japan and he's been letting me play his. The UMD cases are on there for good, it can't see how you could open tit up without damagaing anything. His dad is the vice president for US home movie distribution, so I figure he'd be the exact person to ask: I asked if Sony was planning on making a UMD player for home use and he said yea. I also had a discussion about how it could possibly survive against the Blu ray for home use. With UMD you will be able to notice the low rez on a HD screen, but with Blu Ray you wouldn't. So in my opinion I think UMD will be what Hi8 was for home entertainment. With Blu ray coming and all the HD TVs everywhere, I personally don't think the UMD will make it past the PSP, but I could be wrong. If you want me to check anything out on the PSP or UMD then feel free to ask, I just can't open it up or try to crack the UMDs, but I can look for stuff.

I don't care about the movies anyway, but after reading this report, I'm a little concerned about future PSP games.

PSP Game Region Codes
 

Gamespot is a horrible source for any news on the PSP, they keep shooting themselves in the foot with false reports. Sony originally announced and has re-announced that Games are region free. Video (Movies) are not region free, and some games have a Movie playback section within them (ie. NFS)... usually assigned to music videos... there is no word, that I have seen, whether these Movie playback sections will work cross-region.




No ADVERTISING ---TD!

well i think they gonna hack the psp buy using a hack firmware that allows u to play backup games from the memory stick. and i think psp games are just around 300-900MB's for now. well thats just my opinion anyways, i could be wrong. :)

a UMD reader is the PSP UMD reader vis USB to PC

The PSP uses a proprietary Sony disc called the UMD, or Universal Media Disc. Capable of storing up to 1.8GB of data (a CD holds 0.650GB, a DVD holds 4.7GB), the UMD is a disc format enclosed in a small cartridge (similar to the Sony Mini-Disc format.)

Are PSP discs writeable or rewriteable?

No, the UMD cannot be written to. Only Sony will be able to create UMD media -- the company has no plans to make external UMD writers devices, and even third-party publishers will not be able to create their own discs without Sony's ability to press the data to UMD.


So with that said, I don't think the PSP is worth it and will die because of this UMD format. why would I buy a movie in UMD format if I can't play it in anything else??? If you could burn your music or data if they are going to turn it into a pda then it might have been worth it. With the screen size I can convert a movie to fit onto 256mb and use the memory stick to watch my movies I can convert from DVD's I own. But that's still only 4 movies on 1Gb stick. Maybe Netflix will make them allow you to rent UMD movies and the only good thing is you are less likely to scratch them up. that's my 2 cents.

potential hack
 

Why is everyone talking about reading UMD on a dvd drive, sony licensing 3rd party UMD re-writables, or etc etc. These hacks are completely counter-intuitive.

Without claiming to know all the technical details, I can already envision hacks installed on the Memory Stick that will enable us to:

1) Rip the entire game or movie off PSP to a computer via USB or the WLAN.

2) Run ripped content in some sort of modified package on the memory stick. There are already 2gb MS out there with 4gb or more coming in the future, so the capacity is hardly a problem.

3) Hacked firmwire that, using the USB cable, can connect to external USB hard drive or hard drive-based mp3 player(such as ipod) for transfering files. Playing video directly off the drive is possible too.

What i think is unlikely to happen is to actually have some sorta of pirated UMD discs running around, because it is expensive and unpractical.

What about the speed of the memory sticks, are they slower or faster than the UMD disks, because if they are slower to read than that would be a big problem playing games off of them.

Very good question.

Does anybody know?

lol of course the read speed on the memory stick is faster than the UMD.

With USB II, you should be able to play the games directly from your PC ..
the wirless connection would prob work too, just a little slower.

What is the max. speed for the PSP's wifi?

You could save all your games onto your computers hardrive and then just stream them to your PSP.

And then write any games to your memorystick duo so you don'thave to take the actual UMD.

y direct connect? when you could save it to memory stick?

PSP uses Wi-Fi 'B' so it's the slower standard of the two currently out at the moment - although it's fine for streaming updates and online play for what I've seen of it so far :)

It seems as though we will very soon be able to load games off the memory stick.
A ripper has been released that copies games directly from the UMD to the memory stick. However, when you go to try and load the file, it will only load the opening credits.
As soon as those bugs are fixed its going to be great.
Lumines is only like 200mb, etc however Ridge Racer and NFS: Rivals is like 700mb.

Moral of the story- Be sure to buy a 1gb Duo instead of 256 or 512mb card.

Will keep you updated.

Hi Hi...

Its even better. A UMD Loader v1.0 was just released today.

OKAY... BEFORE everybody yells at me "OMFG!!!! It´s the Loader! Praise the Lord!!!" hear what I have to say:

It LOADS an Actual UMD inserted into your PSP via an Eboot.PBP!
Again, it Loads your ORIGINAL UMD DISC via an app.
It doesnt load IMAGES!!!


(but rumors said that it CAN be done... but in a way I dont understand. Maybe because im no h3xo4 1337 n00b...?) :D

Won't be long now...

Just to keep the folks updated:

A "launcher" is some kind of ready. It plays Lumines but without Sound.
That will be taken care of in the next days.

Seems like there will then be the launcher File and a patch file for the Boot.bin for every specific game.
(But I guess they will make a "for all working" Launcher in no time...)

Please... don´t flame me by saying "THIS IS ILLEGAL!" or "BAN HIM!"
I didn´t post where to get the File itself... and I wouldnt!

So stay tuned for Amazing developements to come!

PEACE