PSP 2.0 Update Finally Released

Joshua Keller writes "The v2.0 firmware update for the Sony PSP is finally out, ending the saga of one of the most-talked about firmware revisions I can remember. The update features a web browser for the PSP and support for AAC files, amongst other improvements."

Comments

Start the timers...

[ChrisF79]

I can't wait to see how soon someone "cracks" this firmware so it runs emulators and what not. I don't have a PSP, and not much interest in getting one. However, I do think it is pretty interesting to watch these folks go to work and produce these hacks or what-not. I'm always amazed at how fast some of these protections that companies work so hard to implement are dismissed.

Re:Start the timers...

[ziggy the zagnut]

Yeah, it used be pretty cool to watch protection get broken,
but the PSP is part of a new generation of DRM. We're
seeing some rules get bent/broken. For example, having
access to the hardware no longer means you 0wn the machine.
Classic techniques like tracing through code from
the beginning of its execution are obsolete.

Another obstacle to opening the device is the (threat of the) law.
When the PSP first came out, the website ps2dev.org quickly
created space for discussion of opening it up. Once 1.5 opened
up though, ps2dev quickly began to squash all discussion of
opening attempts. They referred to "Grey Areas" in their
censorship, claiming their goal of homebrew capability has
been reached. Ps2dev admins prefer to keep it a small, elite community of
1.5 users, as opposed to the more idealistic and democratic
goal of enabling anyone who buys the hardware to be able to
develop and run homebrew.

The only alternative is the piracy underground, whose goals are
different, but whose technology overlaps with the homebrewers.
Because they're illegal, pirates don't have public information
bases and their information is more valuable. This means
any potential developers have to work their way into a
social network, again, reserving homebrew capability for
a dedicated elite.

Currently there are several commerical companies interesting
in opening the PSP to public development (mostly because
they want to sell modchips). They've given dozens of PSPs
to promising openers, but no dice so far. Any attempts
on the hardware, similar to Xbox, for example, would require
high-speed equipment. Observing the PCB of the PSP,
for example, shows signficant tromboning (a technique of inserting extra space into circuit board traces to meet
extremely tight timing requirements) on the PSPs combined
flash/DRAM chip. Also preventitive is the use of a MIPS
core: the pinout of the MIPS processor is unknown, as well
as what IPL code it boots with. It may even included its own
encryption. Several varities of encryption, from crackable to strong (AES128) encryption are used in nearly every part of the
PSP firmware.

The situation is so far from ideal, some promote the "Sony Leak Theory." The hypothesis is that Sony
left open leaks on purpose in older firmware and encouraged
the development of emulators in order to krush its kompetition,
the Nintendo Revolution. Under this theory, Sony is confident
that its DRM will prevent any future homebrew/piracy.

Perhaps the PSP experience will serve as a weathervane for
the future of DRM in consumer products.

Re:Start the timers...

[ziggy the zagnut]

You make some good responses to what I wrote, so let me to respond to those. First, there, of course, is no explicit right to consumer electronics freedom in any constitution anywhere. However, you must realize that we confer these rights on ourselves! When the U.S. Const. was first written, they had a debate about what they wanted to put in there. Consider this, here, the continuation of that debate. If enough of us can push in this direction, we can establish this right for ourselves. There are numerous arguments for the freedom, from basic ideas about having a choice, to allowing corporations the use of certain public resources, to environmentalist arguments against prematurely obsolete hardware all the way back to enabling third parties to compete in the software market. All of these arguments speak against closed hardware, and that hardware openness should be government enforced. Second, about "don't buy it if you don't like it." This is a.k.a. "vote with your dollar." It's a good idea- in theory. I mean, theoretically, if there were a market for something like what we want, someone could start selling it. The only problem is, in reality, the vote with your dollar argument has been tried, and it doesn't work well. The reason is that it's not fast enough. it's kind of like patents. If nobody could "the computer" for 25 years, where would we buy? Still on the 2nd generation. The world simply changes too fast for market-based Darwinism to be effective. This is compounded by the massive amount diseducated consumers. Finally, if Sony were to offer us a "shiny toy" that lets me do what I want, I would buy it. In fact, they have a history of supporting homebrew (see Yaroze, and ps2linux). It's frustrating that they don't now. Although many people suspect they allowed the homebrewers access to early firmware on purpose to appease them. (The theory goes they couldn't do this explicity because it would infuriate the launch title publishers). Like I said, the reason the PSP is so interesting for Linux users is because the day may soon some when we can't run Linux due to DRM. We need to prepare and possibly act strategically.

Re:Start the timers...

[Torgo's Pizza]

As ripped from PSPHacks.net:

Some very interesting things going on in the PSP hacking world.

It would seem that someone has gotten the DATA.PSP files from the various update EBOOT.PBP files decrypted.

This is the next step in unlocking the secrets of the PSP's firmware. How to flash/re-flash, and modifying firmware files to suit individual hacker's needs, etc...

A small sample:

msgupdater_error_lowbattery
msgshare_error_conten t_corrupted_update
msgupdater_remove_umd
msgupda ter_versions
msgupdater_dot
msgupdater_%d_%02d
    updater_start_update
updater_license_ask
updater _function_list
updater_start_update
updater_lice nse_consent
msgupdater_accept_eula
updater_licen se_consent_text
updater_license_consent_version_t ext
mlist_updater_license_ask
msgupdater_start_u pdate_ms
msgupdater_start_update_umd
updater_sta rt_update_text
updater_start_update_version_text
  msgupdater_eula
updater_main
updater_updating
    updater_main
Ignoring extra png_read_update_info() call; row buffer not reallocated
update_plugin
msgshare_error_content _corrupted_update
msgshare_updateprompt_updateunn ecessary
msgupdater_list_add
msgupdater_updating _ms
msgupdater_updating_umd
msgupdater_updated
    msgupdater_cancel_update_ask

Makes for some very interesting times ahead I'm thinking.

Copy Protection

[phase_9]

And once again nerfs current Homebrew / copy protection workarounds Forced firmware updates (which all new games will feature) are a very inteligent way of ensuring their copy protection remains in effect - are people considering such a system for the next Video Standard (HD-DVD / whatever is flavour of the week), everytime you buy / rent a movie it updates the firmware on your player? btw: my Import JAP PSP is still running 1.00 and is proud of the matter (RIN Rocks!)

Ironically Day after Snes emulator at full speed

[marcybots]

This awesome firware update ironically comes out in america the day after the supernintendo emulator for the PSP is able to run Super metroid and 90% of all super nintendo games at 60 frames per second (full speed) with zero frame skip since it can take advantage of speed hacks. Even final final fantasy III can run at almost full speed (dips slightly when entering combat to 55 frames a second). Talk about bad timing.
      Its much better super nintendo emulation than any five month old system has any right having, I really wish that sony would wise up start issuing its formal stamp of approval to emulators so and certain other homebrew apps so there would be no other legitimate excuse for non-pirates not to upgrade their psp firmware, I would upgrade it in a minute if sony was selling a official genesis emulator made by sega that ran at full speed and cost like ten dollars.

Re:AAC a sign of truce with Apple?

[Midnight Thunder]

AAC is not an Apple file format. It is owned by Dolby and is part of the MPEG4 spec. What is owned by Apple is the DRM, known as FairPlay, that is used by the AAC files from the iTunes store.

I think that if Sony is using AAC, it is because they are including support for MPEG video, so it is more of a side effect, rather than anything else. Now it would be nice to see Apple allowing Sony to use their DRM, but it is probably going to be a question of who is going to be more pig-headed.

It should also be noted that Sony Electronics and Sony Music often act as if they were two different companys doing things that conflict with the position of the other entity.

Actual progress made on hacking 2.0 by WAB ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Posted over at DCEmu Forums http://www.dcemu.co.uk/vbulletin/showthread.php?t= 9716 The Wab team have uncovered an exploit for the new firmware?? How To : !!! HOW use it !!! Put your two folders on your games folders and run it .your game boot and freeze your psps on white screen .after your psps shutdown it's because your second eboot.pbp like on kxploit "From pspsdev team for psp 1.5" is corrupted juste find teh 02000800 and replace the 08 by 01 for test in the header of your elf it's easy but it's proof concept the psp 2.0 can read the elf but in another format . More at that link --> http://www.dcemu.co.uk/vbulletin/showthread.php?t= 9716

It's called the DS upgrade.

[Viewsonic]

In all seriousness, it is absolutely amazing to see so many companies who want to get into the handheld market fail so miserably. It is like a voodoo curse on anyone other than Nintendo that even thinks of trying to break into the market. Sony came out with this very fast, slick handheld, and.. then.. nothing! They release it all at different times all over the world basically forcing people to buy the competition. It's like Sony gave up at the last minute or something out of nowhere. Huge shortage of decent games to buy, and even the ones that are worth buying are priced right out of the handhedl market! Have you even seen how much the PSP movies cost?? You can go buy the DVD which is higher quality, tons of extras for around $10-15 at places, or you can buy the PSP version that is lower res, virtually no extras, and costs $30!! Did some marketing goon just show up on launch day and say "Hey, lets set prices for this stuff so no one buys it!!" and they all went "Okay!!"??

Seriously, where is all the sensible PSP marketing? I sometimes wonder if Nintendo plants people into other companies that have any sort of draw and have them derail their products on purpose. It is just UNREAL how bad everyone has failed trying to get into the handheld market.

Re:It's called the DS upgrade.

[badasscat]

I'd agree with you except for the fact that UMD movies are selling amazingly well.

They're not selling "amazingly well" - the top ones have sold around 100,000 copies worldwide. That's 1/10 what a popular game sells and about 1/100 what a popular DVD sells. Granted, it's with a fairly small installed base of systems, but I'd call that number "decent", not "amazing".

Even "decent" is pretty surprising, though.

As for failing miserably in general, I really don't think that's the case. As a new entrant into the market they have snapped up a pretty decent share of the market in both Japan and the US.

Yeah, but they have spent a TON more on marketing and R&D than Nintendo has, and the system itself costs them more to make. How long are they going to keep this up?

I mean there's really no secret to selling stuff. Put out a good product and price it right and people will buy it. That doesn't mean you'll make money on it, though. I could sell a plasma HDTV for ten bucks and I'm sure I'd sell millions of them and take a nice chunk of market share from the likes of Panasonic and Sony. But I'd be in the poorhouse when all was said and done, so would it be worth it?

All of Nintendo's competitors had mildly successful launches that were similar (in their times) to the PSP launch. But it was all downhill from there, and that's the same thing that's happening now. US hardware numbers are hard to find but we do know that in Japan, the DS is gaining steam while the PSP is fading. (Every week, the gap in hardware sales gets wider - at this point, the DS outsells the PSP by about 2:1.) With the release of Nintendogs here, I would expect a similar gap would open in the US. Sony's own published sales numbers worldwide have not been all that impressive in comparison with Nintendo's.

And that's with Sony trying really hard. Once they decide they don't have the stomach for this anymore - which everyone else has eventually, and Sony will too with the financials they've got at the moment - things will probably just get worse. I mean, Nintendo's practically on cruise control with the DS and they're already winning.

Sony could have done something with the PS3 to promote sales of the PSP, but they didn't. Stick a UMD drive in there, make the system compatible, heck, make it a UMD writer. No such luck, and that's an ace Sony had up their sleeve that they didn't take advantage of.

I wouldn't write off the PSP completely. Things can always turn around. But the parallels to past Game Boy competitors just can't be ignored at this point.

Wab Exploit for V2.0 Already

[Busshy]

Just read over at http://psp-news.dcemu.co.uk/ that someone has posted news of a possible exploit of the new firmware, on the day sony release it in the USA.

So where's a screenshot of the browser?

[blakespot]

The browser has been kicking around for a few weeks, right? I've not seen one photo or screenshot of it. Is it worth flashing my first gen (in the US) PSP and losing the ability to boot "homebrew" games to use this browser? What sort of keyboard metaphor does it have? Does it support JS? SSL? Flash?

Thanks.

blakespot

Better Technology

[Anonymous Coward]

The thing is that since day one, every person who has tried to compete with Nintendo's handhelds has gone "That thing is a piece of crap. I can easily build something technologically superior to that." And then they go and build something that absolutely smashes the current Nintendo product in terms of horsepower. The Game Gear, the PSP, the Neo Geo Portable, the N-Gage, the Nomad; they're all designed around the assumption that like in the console space, people are dieing to get the next great leap forward and that horsepower sells games.

They're wrong

Handhelds are too small to appreciate horsepower past a certain degree; while there is a difference, is anyone going to notice a slightly crisper texture on a QVGA screen not wider than your index finger is long? And are customers going to care that you can play movies, when many of them only use these devices for 10-15 minutes at a time?

No.

These unreal failures are going to keep going and going until Nintendo competitors realize the same thing that Nintendo(and to a lesser extent, the cell phone providers) have: it's the games, stupid. All the features in the world won't move your product if customers don't have meaningful things to do on it, and TV tuners, movie players, calling capabilities, and web browsers are not meaningful things for a device that small. The meaningful thing to do on these devices is to game, and Sony & company are not going to capture Nintendo's market segment until they are ready to compete on Nintendo's home turf by providing reasonable devices(Game Gear need not apply) and great games.

The GBA series didn't sell 100 million units because they were chic, after all.

Browser User Agent

[zensmile]

Mozilla/4.0+(PSP+(PlayStation+Portable);+2.00)

Enjoy.