Hacking the PSP Blog

Tired of your XMB icons? Why not hack it?

Nope, the image (below) isn't fake. And yes, it is a screenshot of a hacked XMB. Are you interested yet?

We know our handheld's XMB looks fine and well already but changes are sometimes good. As much as you don't want to be wearing the same clothes every day and eating the same food every meal, we are pretty sure you don't want that for your PSP either. XMB Icon Hacking is a Lua application created by homebrew coder kgsws.

As the name implies, the application allows for changing icons on our XMB. It was originally made for 1.5 FWs. Although kgsws isn't sure if there will be complications with other firmwares, he suggested just the same to use custom ones so as to avoid problems.

And lastly in case you're wondering, the images included in the application can be edited using a PC. We know you're still kind of having doubts about this one so we deemed it necessary to include this short video first.



Check out the video here...

Download XMB Icon Hacking

Source: PSPUpdates

Rumor: PSP2 to sport 60GB Samsung hard drive?

Hard to imagine, but it's been over two years since Sony unleashed the PSP (at least in Japan), so it stands to reason that we're due for a little upgrade, right? Well, it's difficult to tell precisely what's going on due to the machine translation, but Samsung introduced its new N-Series line of 1.8-inch hard drives today and there's some indication that a 60GB version of the drive may end up in a future PSP. With any luck we may see a proper announcement at CES next month -- we definitely would not kick a 60GB PSP out of bed -- but for right now we're just trying to figure out exactly what Samsung announced today.



Source: Engadget

Lua Player OpenGL for PSP 1.0/1.5, PS3, Windows

Shine has released a new version of Lua Player for PSP 1.0/1.5, PS3, and Windows with OpenGL support. Here's what he posted about it:

I've started to rewrite Lua Player with the SCons build management and based on OpenGL for all graphics output. For the PSP it uses pspgl, which has some limitations (see #ifdefs in common/LuGL.cpp). I have tested it on a firmware 1.0 and 1.5 PSP, but it doesn't use kernel mode, so it should work with other versions, too.

For Windows and PS3 all OpenGL functions should work (but currently textures are not implemented). The Windows version is compiled with Visual Studio .Net and should not need any Cygwin or other library (except the system libraries and opengl). The PS3 version should work on every 64 bit PS3 linux.

You can download all binaries and source code from http://www.luaplayer.org/LuaPlayer-OpenGL-preview4.zip . A sample animation is included in script.lua, which you can change. This is also very good on Windows or PS3 for learning OpenGL: Open script.lua in an editor, open a command line and after saving the script, restart the program. Hit Escape to exit the program.

Crrently o PSP the 3D rendering is very slow and the graphics looks wrong. Maybe someone has an idea how to fix it.

Would be nice to port it to Linux X11, too. Should be not too difficult: See common/luaplayer.h for the list of functions you have to implement and examples in the psp, ps3 and win32 implementations. On startup you have to call luaplayerMain, then the functions you provide will be called.

Download Lua Player OpenGL

Via DCEmu

Tutorial: Converting CWCheat codes to PSPShark codes

Over at (the QJ) forums, agent_dark64 posted a tutorial on how to convert a CWCheat cheat into a PSPShark cheat. The steps in the tutorial are pretty straightforward - it's basically just six steps. You will need a hex calculator.

As always, please read all the instructions before doing anything.  You might also want to read up on CWCheat and/or PSPShark.

Anyway, here's what agent_dark64 wrote:

Hi,

I'v seen alot of requests on how do you convert a cwcheat to pspShark format. Heres a full tutorial on how its done:

1. First of all, you need to find the game id for the game you are playing: etc
ULES-0063 (you can find this in the cwcheat menu)

2. open up the cheat.db in notepad (we will refer to this as window 2) or a text editor and find the line
_S (insert game id here)

The _C represents the start of a cheat (or the description of the cheat) and the _L is the actual code itself.

3. Open up notepad (we will call this window 1), you are going to use this window to enter/build the pspShark cheat as you go.

4. In window 1, type in 010 (all pspShark cheats most likely start with this)

5. In window 2, For each _L under the _C do the following:

a) you should see two hexidicimal values, like 0x20040000 0x51200000
(for example)

b) take a look at the first number in the first hexidecimal value (it will be either 2,1,0) (in the above example its 2). If its 2 or 1, append the numbers 01 to the text in window 1.
If its 0, append the numbers 02 to the text in window 1.

c) open up windows calculator, make sure "Hex" is selected and type in 08800000 + (The 7 characters after the first number) (so in the above example, you would type 08800000 + 0040000 - (discarding the 2 at the front). Now what ever value shows in calculator, append this to the text in window 1.

d) Now if the first number of the whole thing was 2 or 1 (it was 2 in the example above), append the 8 characters to the right of the first 8 characters in window 1. So in the above example, you would append
51200000. If the first number was 0, then you only append the last 2 characters of the whole thing (in the above example this would be 00 because thats whats at the end)

Keep doing this for all the _L that belongs to that cheat. Do not clear the text in window 1 for each _L.

6. Now you have built your cheat in window 1, go enter it in in pspShark. So for the above example, the final pspShark cheat should be:

010010884000051200000

this is equal to cwcheat:

0x20040000 0x51200000

Source: PSPUpdates

Rumor Alert: Redesigned PSP to surface at E3 2007?

Are you wondering what ever happened to the rumored Redesigned PSP? Well, we have more rumors about it. The Redesigned PSP, according to the buzz, will soon make a public appearance at E3 2007 on May 16 - 18, 2007, in Los Angeles.

The Redesigned PSP will supposedly be released in Japan this coming March 2007 (according to a message posted on Evil Avatar, the date was announced in PlayStation Magazine August, 2006 issue). Other rumors say it wont be available until after the E3. That will be sometime around Christmas 2007 or early 2008.

Anyway, the Redesigned PSP will have the following features according to more rumors:

• Built-in 8GB flash memory chips
• No hard disk drive
• More streamlined, thinner and lighter design
• Built-in still/video camera

Source: Playstation via PSPUpdates