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Hacker Will Try To Restore Linux Support On PS3
Many readers have been sending in news of the impending PS3 firmware update that will remove the ability to install other operating systems on the console. (We discussed it here on Sunday.) Over the past few days, legions of PS3 owners have been voicing their anger at Sony's decision, upset that they'll be forced to either lose their custom install or forgo use of the PlayStation Network and be unable to play certain games and movies. Now, hacker George Hotz, known for his iPhone jailbreaks and his PS3 hack earlier this year, has vowed to fight back and restore Linux support on the PS3. He said, "The PlayStation 3 is the only product I know that loses features throughout its lifecycle. Software PS2 emulation, SACD playback, and OtherOS support are all just software switches you can flip. It's unbelievable you would go and flip one, not just on new boxes you are shipping, but on tens of millions already in the field."
No such luck with Vista or Windows 7 thanks to the extra DRM and my non-hdcp monitor.
That's funny. I watch Blu-Rays just fine on both my Vista and Windows 7 machines which only connect to my monitor via DVI. Or are you one of those idiots who actually uses crappy playback software like PowerDVD to play Blu-Rays?
The so-called "software emulation" was only for the Emotion Engine chip (ps2's CPU). It still required the Graphics Synthesizer chip (video), which was never software-emulated, and is missing in newer PS3s.
Ce n'est pas une signature automatique.
or you've got something like AnyDVD HD installed.
Yep.
Which makes this entire sub-thread just another internet penis measuring contest.
The only reason you can run AnyDVD is because Slysoft found a loophole in the DMCA and moved to a country that will let them exploit it.
It certainly isn't because of MS that you can watch BDs on vista - it is, in fact, in spite of them. Kinda like the way this hacker wants to re-enable linux on the PS3 in spite of Sony's efforts to the contrary.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
This whole thing would have been less surreal and controversial if instead of saying "3.21 means no more OtherOS Just Because." they had "Here's this feature the community has been absolutely begging for, and this one, and this one, and this one... oh, by the way, it'll probably disable OtherOS so plan around that."
What they have done is effectively make pre-3.21 fat PS3s high-value items for the people interested in homebrew, backups and "backups". Eventually they'll be cracked, and they'll have cracked firmwares installed on them that will provide all the official features plus the useful things that Sony apparently skipped on doing all this time to release this potentially crippling update.
Oh, and this all assumes that the OtherOS option will even be necessary to mod the system.
"Most people, I think, don't even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?"
As a member of the PS3Cluster team I would like to say that Sony's cutting off of 3rd party OSes from their platform is going to impact the Air Force, UMass Dartmouth and other organizations using PS3 hardware as massively parallel clusters for scientific computing. This goes far beyond the home-brew market.
We've been covered here before:
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/12/17/2251232
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