Submeg upgrading PSP to 3.03 OE-C

[Harrison]

Ocnce you have downgraded your PSP to 1.5 and the upgraded it to the custome 3.03 OE-C firmware it opens your PSP up to use for a lot of things.

First you can run PSP emulators. There are many including the PSPUAE Amiga emulator. You just copy the emulators to the memory stick in the PSP following the instructions that come with each emulator, add some game roms and then you can launch the emulators.

You can do the same with the homebrew games and programs available.

Next you can run PSP game ISOs. There are full ISO images of PSP UMD game discs. You just copy them to the PSP memory stick in the ISO directory at the root of the memory stick and then you can boot the games diirectly.

And finally PSX games. You can also convert Playstation One games and then run them on the PSP just like a PSP game.

A good site to start with is http://psp-news.dcemu.co.uk/ as it contains links to most available emulators, homebrew games and lots more.

Some other cool sites worth looking at include:

http://www.pspuae.com/ (Amiga emulator of course)
http://yoyofr92.free.fr/psp/snespsp.html (the great PSP SNES emulator that is perfect)
http://www.pspbrew.com/ (another general scene site with a lot of information and links)
http://www.psp-hacks.com/ (contains most files needed for anything PSP)
http://forums.maxconsole.net/ (this forum contains the most information and knowledgeable people in the PSP scene. This forum is the first place most things get announced and discussed and this is also where hackers such as Dark_AleX release their custom firmwares. It also has a lot for other systems too).

[Harrison]

BTW, for PSP Game ISOs just search on most P2P networks and you should find them quite easily. Also try places like ISOHunt.

[Submeg]

Sweet, it worked, so how do I get PSPUAE to run?

[Demon Cleaner]

There's a tutorial for PSPUAE on the main site.

[Submeg]

Lol, yea I remembered just after I posted whoops!

[Harrison]

Oh, one thing I forgot to mention.

Now that your PSP has 3.03 OE-C, format the memory stick again and it will create a few new directories on the memory stick. When you look at the contents from your PC you will see some new directories.

In the root of the memory stick is a new directory called ISO. Just copy any game ISOs into here, then from the PSP you can go to the memory stick and launch them.

Inside the PSP directory are two new directories, GAME150 and GAME303. Normally if you want to run emulators or homebrew place them into the GAME150 directory, and again to run them

If the instructions with an emulator or homebrew software refer to a method for 1.5 and other versions, just follow the 1.5 instructions.

So for example, with PSPUAE just copy the folders and files it instructs into the GAME150 directory. Then from the PSP go to Game section and then the Memory stick and the emulator should be listed in there ready to load and run.

An additional feature of the custom firmware is a boot menu. When you switch your PSP on you can hold down the R button and it will boot to a custom menu. In here you can change many aspects of how the PSP will work. Only change things if you understand what it will do, otherwise you can mess things up.

A couple of useful features of this Boot/recovery menu are inside the configuration menu.

1, Hide Corrupt Icons is useful to enable, otherwise emulators and other homebrew can display some of their files as corrupt files in the PSP menu system.
2, Use No-UMD - This is an important option. When it is disabled you need to have a game UMD in your PSP when you wish to run any game ISOs. The PSP uses the game UMD to bypass the game protection and boot the ISO. You can however enable No-UMD mode with this option so you don't need a disc in the drive to run ISOs. This doesn't work with all games though.
3, Free UMD region allows you to run Film UMDs from other regions.
4, Fake Region tricks the PSP into showing a game or film it is a specific region.
5, Game Folder Homebrew. This tells the PSP what mode to run files in the normal PSP/Game directory. Leave it as 3.03 and just use the GAME150 for most files as it is easier.

A new feature of the actual 3.03 firmware worth using as an option in the system settings menu. You can now disable the autobooting of a UMD in the drive. So if you keep a disc in the drive so that ISOs boot correctly you can disable them autobooting when the PSP is switched on to stop them running.

I think that is about it. If you have any other questions please ask.

[Submeg]

question, can I use the ROMS that I use for WinUAE with PSPUAE?

Also, which Dark-Alex firmware should I use?

[Harrison]

Indeed you can, and this is the same for all emulator roms. SNES roms work with the PSP SNES emulator, Amiga ADFs work with PSPUAE etc... So nice and easy to get running.

So for PSPUAE just copy the emulators %__SCE__PSPUAE and __SCE__PSPUAE directories into the PSP/GAME150 directory on your PSP then you need to rename your kickstart files to the names it instructs in the emulators readme file, and copy them to the memory stick, and finally just copy the game ADFs you wis to play into the PSP/GAME150/__SCE__PSPUAE/DISKS/ directory and then run the emulator. Pretty straight forward.

Do remember that some games might have trouble working as the emulator is still in development and behind WINUAE in compatibility so far.

I recommend you try Turrican as this will show you how good the emulator is.

BTW, I also highly recommend you try the SNES emulator as it runs every SNES game I have tried so far perfectly.

[Harrison]

Also, which Dark-Alex firmware should I use?

Ah, so you are currently at firmware 1.5?

You should currently use Darl-Alex firmare 3.03 OE-C. There is a newer 3.10 OE-A firmware but it currently has a few problems so unless specific features are needed I don't recommend using that one yet.

Just follow the second part of the mini guide I added under the 1.5 downgrading info. Here it is again for you:

Now you are at firmware 1.5 you are ready to upgrade to custom firmware 3.03 OE-C

First you will need to download the files needed:

- Custom firmware installer 3.03 OE-C
- Official Sony firmware updater 1.5
- Official Sony firmware updater 3.03

Once you have all of these files unrar the 3.03 OE-C archive and it contains a guide on how to install the firmware. It is quite straight forward. Just make sure you follow the instructions properly and also format your memory card before doing this and charge your PSP to 100% and leave it connected to the mains power before starting.

[Submeg]

How many games are able to be emulated at this time? Did you know that either B-boy or Lumines has the firmware update for 2.7.1?