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PSP 2.0 Update Finally Released

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the for-real-this-time dept.

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."

25 of 243 comments (clear)

  1. In case site gets hammered... by fizz · · Score: 5, Informative

    The North American version of the PSP 2.0 firmware update is now available via the wireless Network Update feature on your PSP. As expected, the 16MB update is nearly identical to the Japanese version released last month.

    The version 2.0 software brings a mobile web browser, new audio and video format support, photo sharing, custom wallpapers and more. Check out the complete release notes after the jump.

    The download and install the update, use your PSP's Network Update feature (Settings > Network Update). Read our PSP Firmware Update Guide if you need further help.

    Update: The PSP 2.0 update is now available for direct download.

    From the official 2.0 update release notes:

    Network
    + An internet browser has been added

    Video
    + 4:3 screen mode has been added (for video saved on Memory Stick Duo media).
    + Go To feature has been added (for UMD Video and UMD Music).
    + A-B Repeat feature has been added (for UMD Video, UMD Music and video saved on Memory Stick Duo media).
    + Audio options have been added (for video saved on Memory Stick Duo media).
    + MP4 (AVC) has been added as a playable file format (for video saved on Memory Stick Duo media).

    Music
    + The combination of SonicStage version 3.2 (or later) and PSP system software 2.0 (or later) has made it possible for music files in ATRAC3 plus format to be transferred to a Memory Stock PRO Duo.
    + MP4 (the audio codec for MP4 format audio files is MPEG-4 AAC) and WAV (Linear PCM) have been added as playable file formats (for music saved on Memory Stick Duo media).

    Photo
    + Wallpaper feature has been added.
    + Image transfer feature has been added.
    + TIFF, GIF, PNG and BMP have been added as viewable file formats.

    Settings
    + Korean has been added as a system language in [System Settings].
    + [Character Set] has been added in [System Settings].
    + [Theme Settings] has been added.
    + [Internet Browser Start Control] has been added as a security mode in [Security Settings].
    + WPA-PSK (TKIP) has been added as a security mode in [Network Settings].
    + Web address shortcut feature has been added as an input mode for the on-screen keyboard.

    (Mirror) Download from here (Mirror)

  2. Don't install it! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    Don't use firmware 2.0. It disables all ability for homebrew games, emulators, etc.

    1. Re:Don't install it! by CerebusUS · · Score: 4, Informative

      This assumes, of course, that you managed to buy a 1.50 PSP and then didn't bother to upgrade it to 1.51 or 1.52.

      If you have anything other than a 1.00 (Japanese only) or 1.50 PSP, you already can't run homebrew games and apps.

    2. Re:Don't install it! by NelsonM · · Score: 3, Informative

      Another word of warning: It won't be easy to avoid this, because Sony is going to put the 2.0 firmware update in some of the newer games. As soon as you load the game, it'll auto-install the update and all your homebrew stuff will be disabled.

    3. Re:Don't install it! by radish · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Unless, of course, you have no interest in such homebrew stuff. Which would include me. I do however like using the web browser from the couch. Whatever floats your boat :)

      --

      ---- Den ene knappen er powerknapp, den andre er Bender voice knapp "Bite My Shiny Metal Ass"

  3. Start the timers... by ChrisF79 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    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.

    --
    Finance tutorials and more! Understandfinance
    1. Re:Start the timers... by imsabbel · · Score: 3, Informative

      They didnt crack the last release, so i doubt they crack this one.

      --
      HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
    2. Re:Start the timers... by ziggy+the+zagnut · · Score: 5, Interesting

      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.

    3. Re:Start the timers... by Torgo's+Pizza · · Score: 4, Informative

      I'll take you up on that bet. Hackers have just decrypted the EBOOT.PBP today. Just a matter of time now it appears.

  4. Re:That's great... by slashflood · · Score: 4, Informative

    ..but does it run Linux?

    Sure.

    ... via Bochs.

  5. Major bugfix? by mnemonic_ · · Score: 5, Funny

    Did they fix that one really significant bug? You know, where all the games fucking suck? If not, I hope they fix it soon.

    1. Re:Major bugfix? by thatguywhoiam · · Score: 5, Insightful
      Did they fix that one really significant bug? You know, where all the games fucking suck? If not, I hope they fix it soon.

      Did you try Wipeout Pure? It doesn't suck at all.

      Lumines doesn't suck at all.

      But the rest mostly suck. Hand it to Sony to release their new handheld platform at the beginning of the slow summer season. Fall looks promising though (as usual).

      --
      If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
    2. Re:Major bugfix? by apoc06 · · Score: 4, Informative

      not all the games suck. just do a little research before you plunk down your money. i recommend lumines and wipeout pure. two AAA quality titles. metal gear acid is good too, but was a lil too involved for me at the time, so i never got into it. its still in its infancy stage, so dont expect god of war on the psp just yet.

      one thing i dont see ever praised about the psp is its ability to add content. i guess its always overshadowed by the homebrew explosion, but its something only pc and a few xbox games have taken advantage of. you can add your own music to games, and download expansion packs via internet or usb. a really revolutionary concept for a handheld, and something that needs to become standard in the console market. in theory, since you arent altering the content of the product, developers could release a devkit [for their game] and let users create their own mods [maps, skins, tracks, dungeons, etc...]

      converting video on the psp is a breeze surprisingly. at first the tutorials make it seem like such a burden, but once you try it, its relatively simple. mainly you just need to make a folder and a subfolder in the root directory of your memory stick, download and install pspvideo9 http://www.pspvideo9.com/ and youre in business.

      you just set it up to with your default video preferences [resolution/frame rate/ sound settings / etc] tell it where you want to store your movies, and the drive your psp connects as, and youre in business. it can queue jobs for you, so you can walk off while it does its business and have it process a whole slew of files for you.

      when youre ready to go, you can just press sync, and it will transfer all [or some] of the files over for you. its all a breeze. it has a display for you so that you can see how the space on your memory stick is being used [how much is free, how much space is taken by game saves or music or video] it also has a size calculator so you can alter settings accordingly for a movie if you want a smaller filesize. its not perfect, but all around its a great program.

      i wonder when they will rerelease it so that it can utilize some of the newer 2.0 mp4 formats?

  6. Copy Protection by phase_9 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    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!)

  7. Firmwares for game systems?? by bugbeak · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You know you've lost yourself in the console market when you need to get firmware updates for your console, even though you could automatically get it through games you buy. IMO, it just shows that the product will always be incomplete.

    And this isn't just for Sony and the PSP.

    1. Re:Firmwares for game systems?? by Evan+Meakyl · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yes, but before, all the interesting features where there when you bought the console!! (ie playing games... I agree now we can ask more)

      More over, once you started this kind of circle (new features->new bugs->update firmware, which includes new features->new bugs->update...) it's not a good thing, for you customers(you need to update a lot, sometimes losing your data or your habits) and for the company: it shows that the software department isn't able to cope with what they are asked (functionnal and bugless products).

      IMHO, the firmware should be as stable as rock.

  8. Tofu babies by milktoastman · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Oh my days of console gaming are long gone. i shed a hard tear or four for those days. Back when I was a lighter spud (a kid, in the 'up down' speak), I saddly have some of my fondest memories from playing games back then. But I think the biggest reason I liked them was because of the cartoony surreality of the graphics back then. Now, with all the capabilities for photo-realistic graphics, it loses its charm. How many snakes, for instance, can smile within 10,000 pixels these days, but not we forget how the snakes from SM2 made us smile. Thank god humans don't bud, eh? What would console makers do for controllers the? But I digress....anyway, does anyone else shed the tears I described for the innocent days of game play?

  9. Re:Upgrade? by buffer-overflowed · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If you want homebrew+main device functionality(playing games), the PSP is not for you. At least not until Sony seriously changes their attitude towards it.

    Seriously, get a gizmondo handheld which is BUILT solely for homebrew(and cheaper) or go Nintendo + Flash(also cheaper) and join the legions of GBA hackers who moved onto the DS. Or, ya know, go back to stop caring Johnny Come Lately.

    Stop being silly with too much disposable income and just go ahead and upgrade the thing already. You know you're going to anyway when GTA comes out.

    --
    The key to the enjoyment of pop music is to replace any instance of "love" with "C.H.U.D."
  10. Ironically Day after Snes emulator at full speed by marcybots · · Score: 5, Interesting

    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.

  11. PSP 2.0 and Airport Extreme WPA by BMonger · · Score: 5, Informative

    If you have an Airport Extreme base station and cannot get your PSP connected via WPA you need to install the 5.5.1 firmware on your Airport Extreme (possible a "downgrade").

    Spent a good while troubleshooting then googling till I arrived at this.

  12. On emultaors and piracy by Digital_Quartz · · Score: 4, Funny

    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

    Because no one using an emulator is a pirate. All those roms, they ripped themselves from the cartridges.

  13. It's called the DS upgrade. by Viewsonic · · Score: 5, Interesting
    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.

    1. Re:It's called the DS upgrade. by radish · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'd agree with you except for the fact that UMD movies are selling amazingly well. No, I don't know why, and yes, they are a rip off, but hey.

      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. I know my local EB Games has (and sells) more PSP stuff than DS. As for the games being good, I posted here previously that if you go to metacritic and compare DS to PSP you get a considerably higher number (and percentage) of games for the PSP rated highly. Whilst the PSP lineup is certainly not stellar right now (quiet summer season), there are some great games out there - Wipeout, Ridge Racers, Lumines & Mercury are all ones I really like. Others rave about MGA, Twisted Metal, etc. Looking at the currently available DS games, well, only a few really appeal to me at all. Sure there are supposed to be some good ones coming down the line, but they're not here yet.

      --

      ---- Den ene knappen er powerknapp, den andre er Bender voice knapp "Bite My Shiny Metal Ass"

  14. Europe is still waiting for v1.0 by dascandy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If they'd just sell the stuff here... we might consider upgrading...

  15. Re:So where's a screenshot of the browser? by radish · · Score: 3, Informative

    It looks pretty nice, and is remarkably compatible with most sites. Navigation takes a bit of getting used to, as does text entry (it uses the same keypad as the rest of the PSP interface). Features:

    JS: Yes
    SSL: Yes
    Flash: No
    Java: No
    ActiveX: No
    CSS: Yes

    --

    ---- Den ene knappen er powerknapp, den andre er Bender voice knapp "Bite My Shiny Metal Ass"