Dishing off lots of firmware to protect the Sony PlayStation Portable may be taking its toll for Sony engineers. Now, Sony Computer Entertainment wants to know through a survey why you're hacking your PSP in the first place. More details after the jump.

All for one, and one for all. A project promulgated under the collective Noobz - more officially branded as N00bz! - has given birth to another monumental development in homebrew: a PSP unbricker for every Sony PlayStation Portable. In short summary, it would perform the following:

1. You run a program on a homebrew-enabled PSP that will convert a standard PSP battery into a jigkick battery. Note that you can't then use that battery normally - so you should use a spare one.
2. You run a program to generate the unbricker memory stick image, built from the v1.5 update EBOOT (note that this, and the custom IPL, means the release is completely free of Sony copyright materials).
3. You run some programs on a PC to install the image to your memory stick.

Earlier, Fanjita announced that Noobz and C+D developers would release an unbricker for bricked PSPs as a result of a "faulty decryption algorithm," but the C+D devs thought they could do even better. Chalking up another feat to the Prometheus project, C+D created an unbricker for all PSPs, even without accessing the official software or hardware. But in essence, the feat wouldn't have made successful waves if the the following victories hadn't made ripples to start with:

• Reverse engineering of the service (unbrick) mode
• Development of a technique to change an ordinary battery into a service mode trigger battery (and back)
• Development of custom IPL code along with a technique to sign that code as authentic

Click on Full Article right after the jump for more.

Just as Noobz warns, please take care to read the file's readme for the instructions. Failure to do so will cause degrees of risk to your PSP.

Thanks to demologik, EXTER, and MozyMan for the tip off!

Download: Pandora's Battery
Donate (PayPal): N00bz!

Yes, that is right! Another downgrader is in progress as we speak. Yoshihiro, Mathieulh, and Dark_Alex are currently working on a downgrader that will allow you to downgrade your 1.50 to a 1.0 PSP! This was the first firmware that made it onto the PSP, and was only available on Japanese PSP's at launch. This first firmware was, and still is the only firmware that will allow us to run unsigned eboot files without any exploits. Nem was the first to release a homebrew application in the classic form of a "Hello World" application. The one benefit for this downgrade is the ability to run unsigned eboots, and ultimately hacked firmware. This means that, like the Undiluted Platinum modchip, we will be able to use custom firmware as our firmware. This downgrader has been tested by FreePlay and Dark_Alex to work, so all looks promising!

Mathieulh, Yoshihiro, and Dark_Alex will be releasing this downgrader tomorrow if everything goes to plan. We will inform you all when the downgrader comes out as fast as humanly possible. In the time being, feel free to check out the talk as it happens in Fanjita's IRC channel. You can access this by opening your IRC client, join the irc.dashhacks.com server and join the channel #noobz.


Mr_Dank was kind enough to link us to the video he just uploaded of him downgrading his 1.50 PSP to 1.00.
Thank you Mr_Dank, we love you! ;) Click here to Digg It!

Forum Issue -

You will have to chat about it in the IRC at this moment because our forums are down due to technical difficulties. The forums should be back up by tomorrow if everything goes according to plan. We are sorry for any inconvience this may have caused you, but you are welcomed to chat in the comments or the IRC channel that I mentioned.

Update #1: Dark_AleX, Yoshihiro and Mathieulh have now released the 1.50 to 1.00 downdater. Remember that to install this program, you will need the help of someone with a 1.00 PSP, and as always there is a risk to brick your PSP whenever you write to the flash memory. Be sure to have your battery charged and your PSP plugged into the power source to make sure you do not lose power while doing this. The steps are as follows, for the person with a 1.00 PSP, and the 1.50 PSP:

Instructions for the 1.00 user:

- Copy the downhelper100 folder to /PSP/GAME/ and start the program.
- It will dump your flash and your ipl to the memory stick. After finished, the program will exit.
Send the folder created at the root of your memory stick called "DOWNDATER" to someone with 1.50 to allow him to downgrade.

Instructions for the 1.50 user:

- Copy __SCE__downdater100 and %__SCE__downdater100 to /PSP/GAME/
- Get the DOWNDATER folder from your friend with a 1.00 version PSP and put it on the memory stick.
- Get the official Sony 1.50 update and put it under /PSP/GAME/UPDATE
- Start the program.
Note: You need to set the language of your psp to either english or japanese before starting (anyways, it will advise you if you don't have that requirement and it will exit safely). Also, connect the PSP to the AC adaptor.
- After a confirmation with the X button, you PSP will start to flas to 1.00.

DO NOT REMOVE the memory stick and DO NOT shut down the PSP.

After it is finished, the program will tell you to restart the PSP manually, and you will have a 1.00 PSP. Remember, this will flash your PSP's flash memory and you could potentially brick (break) your PSP.

Before downgrading, make sure you meet the following requirements -
Your PSP is not a TA-082. This downgrader has you to be tested on a PSP with this type of motherboard. (If you do have this PSP version, it may result in a brick). [Find out if you have one!]

If you are willing to try this and know the possible consequences, you must enter a password for the file.

The password for the download (when you extract) is: I_Use_It_At_My_Own_Risk

Download: [1.50 to 1.00 Downgrader "Downdater 1.00"]

Recently you have been hearing about work being done on getting out an easy to install modchip, that would allow you to run multiple firmware versions on the same PSP, and probably do many more things. Such modchip has yet to be released though, and PSP fanboys are growing anxious. As a solution to this problem, they made their own! Here we have four successful attempts to run multiple firmware versions on the same PSP. Now they aren't as pretty as the modchip that will be eventually released, but these bad boys still work, and also gave a sense of accomplishment. 

Designed by 0okm


Designed by ryoko_no_usagi


Designed by BOOSTER and friends


Designed by Nem

Well, we’re at a crossroads with regards to PSP Hacking, what with the announcement of a PSP Modchip. And co-incidentally, I’d been working on an article pretty much related to the history of PSP hacking. So what better time to present it? Well here goes.

I’m sure our readers are quite curious about the history of PSP Hacking. I can state that about 60%-70% of our readers have joined us within the last 6-8 months. And trust me, your time hasn’t been as exciting as the first few months after the release of the PSP.

We’ve had the Firmware Updates, the eLoaders, the ISO Loaders, and loads more, and just about everyone knows about them. But far too few people know or remember the first few weeks/months when the PSP came out.  Lets go on a small journey, shall we?

Full article after the jump. You know you want to read it - history is good for you!