World first PS3 jailbreak (mod delete if necessary)

[Janus67]

Called PSJailbreak

Without venturing to deep into gray area, I found this to be pretty cool.

http://psx-scene.com/forums/cmps_index.php
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/08/the-ps3-jailbroken-usb-hack-allows-homebrew-copied-games.ars

Apparently they found a way to put a PS3 into debug-mode to be able to load software through a dongle/flash drive (not sure which yet - if it is just a flash drive I can see this softmod software ending up super-pirated/cloned). With the software it allows you to backup a full game onto the internal/(or attached) external hard drive on the PS3 (read HDLoader, basically). It just needs a normal PS3 game in the game slot to load any others. As well as opening roots for homebrew and other applications.


edit: just saw the 360softmod thread about half a page down, feel free to delete if I'm stepping over any boundries with this thread.

[zexmarquies01]

Well, there's one major difference with this than most console mods.

You can't go to a torrent site, and just download a PS3 game and load it up. The backup utility is *NOT* an .ISO loader.

When you backup the game, it backs up the actual game files. An ISO is not created. Plus, it's currently stuck using FAT32 at the moment, so it wouldn't work as an ISO loader anyways.

But you have to physically have the disc and back it up yourself for this to work.

They state that the loading times / speed of the internal HDD is around 2x faster than using the Bluray disc's. Which I imagine would be true. Many PS3 games install to the HDD for this reason ALONE. I have no idea about the speed of a USB 2.0 External HDD. But seeing video's of people using one, I'd imagine that USB 2.0 is probably on par with the Bluray disc's speeds.

Also, this is not a simple USB thumb-drive. Evidently, sony uses special USB dongles to force PS3's into debug mode when they are repairing them. It appears that one of those got leaked, And someone basically reverse engendered it ( or something to that effect ), and loaded it up with the necessary files. Meaning, this thing is NOT a simple thumb drive. It's a mix of software and hardware.

I can't wait to see what kind of homebrew this will allow. People were also saying that since it puts the PS3's into debug mode, it will allow them to install custom firmware.

I'm REALLY hoping people find a way to turn Backwards compatibility on in the later PS3 models. Maybe even find a way to tell the PS3 to add Anti-Aliasing, or render PS2 games in a higher resolution or something. Don't know if that's possible. But it would be nice. I don't use Other-OS, but I'm sure a lot of people would love to have it back.

I'm just hoping the price of these things drops soon. I really don't want to drop $150 on one of these things.

...yes, I have been staying very up to date on the news about this thing. I'm very interested in it, and can't wait to see what people can do.

[thideras]

Sony deserves this.

[BugFreak]

Maybe even find a way to tell the PS3 to add Anti-Aliasing, or render PS2 games in a higher resolution or something.
Now that would be cool, old school resident evil games in hd....mmm yum. Personally I've never understood the whole idea of modding a console. The reason for buying a console is because it is simple, no drivers, no installs, no building, etc. Then they go and try and do all that with one. Why not just build a pc and do whatever you want? That's just me though.

[zexmarquies01]

Now that would be cool, old school resident evil games in hd....mmm yum. Personally I've never understood the whole idea of modding a console. The reason for buying a console is because it is simple, no drivers, no installs, no building, etc. Then they go and try and do all that with one. Why not just build a pc and do whatever you want? That's just me though.

because Metal Gear, Final Fantasy, God of War, Halo, Mario, Zelda games aren't on PC. People don't actually buy consoles for the ease of use. People buy consoles because of the games. Up until the current generation, gaming has almost always been for the geeks/nerds. It's only recently that the casual gamer really came into existence ( in abundant numbers ). Geeks/Nerds want the games, but they don't want to be stuck with the limited hardware and software. It has always been that way, up until recently where grandma started playing wii bowling.

But I can take a PS2 emulator on my computer, and force it to add AA to the PS2 games, or force it to render the game at a really high resolution, then scale it back down to a decent size, giving the appearance of AA.

Would be nice to play say...Shadows of Colossus without any of those in-game slow downs. Even if you had to play it at native res, getting rid of all the slow downs that many of the final PS2 games had would be great!

I just don't know how "open" a debug PS3 is. You can run unsigned code, but how much access to the Cell processor, and GPU do you have? If people have full access, I can see a lot of neat stuff coming out of the homebrew community with this thing.

[xtkxhom3r]

i cant wait till the prices drop or till a clone is made for like 50 bucks so i can give this a try i would love to just load my games from the hdd instead of having to swap disks all the time... its about time they cracked the ps3 its almost time for the ps4 :P

[Cheator]

And the netflix disc could go the way of the dodo

[rainless]

I want Linux back and PS2 backwards compatibility. The ability to copy 50-75GB bluray discs to my 160gb PS3 hard drive doesn't appeal to me.

Hell... even the smaller games are like 25GB.

It was cool copying PS2 games to the PS2 hard drive because they were MAX 4GB and you could basically fit every game you owned onto a 120gb hard drive. But Bluray discs? Not so cool until we get 100 terrabyte 2.5 inch drives.

[thideras]

I want Linux back and PS2 backwards compatibility. The ability to copy 50-75GB bluray discs to my 160gb PS3 hard drive doesn't appeal to me.

Hell... even the smaller games are like 25GB.

It was cool copying PS2 games to the PS2 hard drive because they were MAX 4GB and you could basically fit every game you owned onto a 120gb hard drive. But Bluray discs? Not so cool until we get 100 terrabyte 2.5 inch drives.Those features should come with time, this just opens the door. Remember that you can move them to the internal hard drive or an external drive.

[Janus67]

That and I believe the rips to the hard drive get rid of a lot of the dummy files that make it that size (look at the scrubbed/jtag xbox/wii releases for example).

[wa77ss]

Is this the first step to getting homebrew software?

[zexmarquies01]

Is this the first step to getting homebrew software?

Yup.

New developments in the past couple days...

The Scene ( hackers...etc ) cracked the PSjailbreak device. They dumped the code online for anyone to download. You just need to buy a specific type of USB drive that lets this work. Nearly every supplier in every english speaking country is sold out of compatible USB devices that works with the dump.

A guy is working to make the PSP do the same thing as the PSJailbreak device itself. He's basically creating a USB host emulator, and going to run the code though it. You just run the program, connect the PSP to the PS3 via USB and BAM should work.

But it's still a work in progress at the moment. But hopefully, he'll have it finished within a few days. But you'd need a CFW on your PSP for this to work ( Custom Firmware ).

Other sites are getting ready ( or already began ) selling the dongles. X3 is going to be selling theirs for about $50 if I remember correctly. But most of these sellers have to wait for sony's injunction in Australia to end first.

Sony filed an injunction against the PSjailbreak group ( and all the sellers that will be receiving the USB dongles as well ). Sony is trying to claim that the dongle uses Sony's copyrighted code. PSjailbreak team says it doesn't, that they created the dongle without using Sony's code ( at least, there's none of sony's code in the dongle ). The court rulling on that will be sometime Friday in Australia.

Also, Jailbreaking / Modding devices are LEGAL in Australia. Just as long as the creators / sellers can demonstrate the the device adds functionality to the device being modded, and the main functionality isn't for piracy purposes. So I'm betting that the courts will side with the PSjailbreak team, and sales of the "official" and clone dongles will go on sale almost instantly after the ruling.

But the injunction is of little relevance now. The device has been cracked, dumped, and leaked. Free alternatives are being worked on.

So for those of you waiting, Keep waiting for a few more days or so, and at the least, a PSP version of this should hopefully be out soon ( for free I might add ).

[thideras]

They hacked the hackers! Haha!

Wasn't going to pay $150 for that. That is the cost of the friggin PS3.

[whooping_a_panda]

It's not a USB drive. It's an avr microcontroller. To my understanding all arduino based boards will work nicely for this as per http://hackaday.com/2010/09/01/open-source-version-of-the-play-station-3-jailbreak/

I take the arduino bit back but it does run on teensy boards so it shouldn't be a leap for someone to change the code over.

[madhatter256]

the jailbreak code is out on the web and you can build your own USB jailbreak. All for less than $20 in parts.


^^^ Just saw the previous post!

Right now, it only allows for homebrew, but pretty soon there will be modified versions of the code that will allow for full BD backup onto the HDD, and even run BDRs and d/l games off PSN.

The real purpose is for piracy. If you do homebrew PS3, then chances are you got a hold of a TEST unit, so wanting to get this USB device is simply for piracy.

[zexmarquies01]

They hacked the hackers! Haha!

Wasn't going to pay $150 for that. That is the cost of the friggin PS3.

yeah. BIG ripoff. The USB boards that people can buy themselves to do this are like $20 or so. A bit more depending on which exact board you buy, and where you get it from. They may not have the fancy LED's that tell you if everything was done correctly, but that still doesn't quite add up to $150.

PSjailbreak was selling through specific "authorized" dealers. There's nothing special about these dealers, except if the dealers wanted to be PSjailbreak "authorized" they had to agree to the $150 price tag. If you didn't agree to that price point, PSjailbreak would deal with you.

PSjailbreak screwed way too many times. They released the information WAY to early ( giving sony ample time to file the injunction ), sent out WAY to many dongles to dealers ( which were cracked, dumped and leaked online ), then they postponed the shipping date of the dongles because they wanted better packaging ( the plastic box the USB drive comes in I believe ) because they either didn't have enough, or their current stock wasn't up to snuff. This gave sony even MORE time to get their injunction filed, and gave hackers the extra needed time to dump the contents online.

By the time PSjailbreak is able to sell the dongles, they won't get many sales because they screwed up in nearly every way possible. If they want anyone to buy THEIR dongles, they will HAVE to lower the price to $50 MAXIMUM. Realistically, the price should be around $30'ish.

But the price HAS to drop. There will be a TON of people who will need / want to buy the dongle, simply because they don't have a unlocked PSP, don't want to unlock their PSP, or don't have the ability to buy a cheap dongle, and load all the files into the dongle themselves. There will still be a LARGE market for these things...but not at the $150 price point.

As I said to my friend earlier...

Don't try to scam the hacking community. They will screw you over faster than you can imagine.

[whooping_a_panda]

The real purpose is for piracy. If you do homebrew PS3, then chances are you got a hold of a TEST unit, so wanting to get this USB device is simply for piracy.

i'm firmly against this statement.

the code itself does not contain a backup manager at all, this could easily be homebrewed in, but the jailbreak itself does not inherently lend itself to piracy.

for instance, i run homebrew on my wii through the twilight hack. i've no pirated games, and my primary use of it is to avoid using the netflix disk to watch netflix.

my iphones also jailbroken. no stolen/pirated apps on it, quite the opposite in fact as i've paid far more for cydia apps than i have for app store apps.

[zexmarquies01]

the jailbreak code is out on the web and you can build your own USB jailbreak. All for less than $20 in parts.


^^^ Just saw the previous post!

Right now, it only allows for homebrew, but pretty soon there will be modified versions of the code that will allow for full BD backup onto the HDD

Already done. There is already a patch to turn the backup manager back on. Someone turned it back on the same day the code was put online.

as for your piracy statement, some people will use it for that, no doubt. But there is a large number of people who don't / won't pirate games. They just want hombrew, or like me, Want PS2 compatibility. Also, playing your own backed up games off the HDD should reduce loading times quite a bit.

And how many people actually have a test unit? Hell, most of the people that actually have one would be the ones CREATING homebrew. Their the LEAST likely to commit piracy. The majority of PS3 users have stock, non-test PS3's.

[zexmarquies01]

my iphones also jailbroken. no stolen/pirated apps on it, quite the opposite in fact as i've paid far more for cydia apps than i have for app store apps.

3G UNRESTRICTOR FTW! :attn:

Love that more than anything else I've bought from Cydia. Crunchyroll via 3G! Anime on the go! WOOT! ( I'm a big anime fan. )

[whooping_a_panda]

3G UNRESTRICTOR FTW! :attn:

Love that more than anything else I've bought from Cydia. Crunchyroll via 3G! Anime on the go! WOOT! ( I'm a big anime fan. )

the google voice app is my favorite and it let me drop the 80$+/MB att charges for a text message plan now all my friends text me on a google voice number and i pay the .20$ for that every once and a while someone doesn't know and sends the text to my primary.

back to my original point rainless can probably get his linux back. these things can then easily be set up to be file servers/media pc's and a million other uses that don't involve piracy.

of course a lot of the ps3 community is going to use it for this, and that's unfortunate, but what i really hate to see the homebrew guys' names slandered because of it.

[TollhouseFrank]

so... people who will pay hundreds of dollars for hardware and the latest gadgets.... go to so much trouble so they don't hafta pay 50-60 bucks for a game?

[zexmarquies01]

so... people who will pay hundreds of dollars for hardware and the latest gadgets.... go to so much trouble so they don't hafta pay 50-60 bucks for a game?

Not all of us.

I'm hoping the scene people can turn Backwards Compatibility back on. Especially if it can do forced AA ( in emulators, they tend to do that by having the emulator run the game at like 2-4x the resolution, then scale it down to whatever resolution you'd normally be viewing it at. Giving the illusion of AA. Works VERY well in most games. )

[rainless]

Not all of us.

I'm hoping the scene people can turn Backwards Compatibility back on. Especially if it can do forced AA ( in emulators, they tend to do that by having the emulator run the game at like 2-4x the resolution, then scale it down to whatever resolution you'd normally be viewing it at. Giving the illusion of AA. Works VERY well in most games. )

And I want Linux back.

[David]

I don't think this thread goes against the forum rules, but I'll keep an eye on it anyway, in case someone tries to take the thread in the wrong direction.

This is a very interesting development - I'm with rainless in that I think it would be great if this opens the door to running Linux on it again. The PS3 would make a rather nice Linux-based HTPC, perhaps?

[zexmarquies01]

I don't think this thread goes against the forum rules, but I'll keep an eye on it anyway, in case someone tries to take the thread in the wrong direction.

This is a very interesting development - I'm with rainless in that I think it would be great if this opens the door to running Linux on it again. The PS3 would make a rather nice Linux-based HTPC, perhaps?

Especially if they can fully unlock the PS3 for linux users. Imagine linux, but with full access to the CPU and the GPU. Before sony killed Other-OS, Linux wasn't able to access the GPU, and a couple of the PS3's systems. With this, people may have a way to unlock that stuff.

So I'm hoping that not only do we get the ability to install linux back, but get linux with full hardware support! I'm betting quite a few people would be interested in that ALONE.

[zexmarquies01]

Well, the PSJailbreak has been successfully ported to the TI-84+ Calculator.

The other day, there were some hiccups. The jailbreak wouldn't allow us to mount backed up games, But that was fixed last night, and I can confirm that it does work!

Also, a simple FTP program has been made for the PS3 now. You can now browse, copy, delete, and rename files on the PS3's HDD. Some files can't be copied, or edited, but most can.

So I'm now copying my games, and then FTP'ing them to my Computer. I only have a 160 Gig HDD in the PS3. So I wouldn't be able to hold too many games ( depending on the games that is ). So I'm backing them up to my PC. Using Filezilla. Tried using FlashFXP, but the PS3's FTP program would crash randomly, causing files to not transfer.

Switched to Filezilla, Made sure the the transfer mode is set to ACTIVE, and set the MAXIMUM number of connections to 1. Haven't had a single crash of the program yet. I just backed up, and FTP'd my copy of FF13. FF13 uses 41.1 Gigs on my PC. Took a while for it to backup the game. FTP'ing it didn't take TOO long. Since the PS3 uses a Gigabit port and my PC has a gigabit port as well, It was getting transfer speeds of around 25 - 30MB/s.

I'm going to copy one of my smaller games next, transfer it to my PC. Then delete it from the backup manager. Then I'm going to transfer it BACK to the PS3, and make sure it works. All reports says it does work, but I'm anal, so I want to test it out myself.

I'll post back in a bit letting everyone know if it worked or not.

I just wish there was more Home Brew apps. Currently, there's only the Backup Manager, and the FTP client. So there's not a whole lot to do at the moment.

[zexmarquies01]

It worked. Backed up Red Dead Redemption, sent it to my PC. Deleted it from the PS3, then sent it back to the PS3. Game booted up fine.

Almost done backing up all my games to my computer. Just have God of War 3 left, and I'll be done.

Now to wait for more homebrew apps to be released.

[wa77ss]

This is nuts. I can't believe they finally got all this going! PS3 is def the better buy I think now over the 360. Will need a terabyte or more external HDD to make it reasonable though

[Turd Furguson]

Wow I didn't know about the TI-84 calculator exploit. Now if I can only snag one cheap on eBay....

[zexmarquies01]

This is nuts. I can't believe they finally got all this going! PS3 is def the better buy I think now over the 360. Will need a terabyte or more external HDD to make it reasonable though

The problem is, the PS3 will only read FAT32 external HDD's. So that makes it a PITA. I couldn't get my 160 Gig External to format to FAT32 for the life of me. I tried downloading a bunch of HDD programs, but almost all of them were too old, and wouldn't work on Windows 7 64bit. I ended up saying screw it, and threw that 160 Gig HDD into my PS3. ( It was a 2.5" HDD. One of those small external drives ). I had created a backup of my old PS3 HDD with the backup utility built into the PS3 onto a thumb drive. Installed the new HDD, restored the backup from the thumb drive, and bam. It's as if nothing was changed at all.

But really, All you need is an internal HDD in the PS3 that's larger than 60 gigs ( the OS uses about 10 gigs ). And you can use the PS3 FTP program and just send your backed up games to your computer. Then when you want to play your game, just transfer it back to the PS3. Not the FASTEST method, but it works. Hell, a simple 160 Gig or a 320 Gig HDD would be perfect. Could fit half a dozen games or so on the drive.

Most PS3 games don't come close to the 50 Gig mark. A large number of games tend to be under 10 gigs. The only games that came close to the full capacity of the blu-ray discs were God of War 3, and Final Fantasy 13. Each used about 40 gigs. Everything else was less than 15 Gigs. Most were under 10.

[Janus67]

Very cool, thanks for posting the update. Interesting that they managed to do it with a TI-84, if they can do TI-83plus I will be happy :D

[Turd Furguson]

Very cool, thanks for posting the update. Interesting that they managed to do it with a TI-84, if they can do TI-83plus I will be happy :D

I would rather utilize my iPhone for this than my TI-83 or 89 I have laying around. :chair:

[zexmarquies01]

Very cool, thanks for posting the update. Interesting that they managed to do it with a TI-84, if they can do TI-83plus I will be happy :D

Does the TI-83 use USB? Or does it have the headphone jack looking connector? If it isn't an actual USB jack, then it simply won't be possible to port the hack onto it.


Another small update...

People found a way to remote play *ANY* PS3 game on your PSP. You backup the game to the internal or external HDD, use the PS3FTP and grab one file from the game folder, and edit a part of it, then throw that edited file back into the game folder. Mount the game, then use remote play on your PSP, and load the game.

I have no idea how well it works, since I haven't tried it yet. Would also be hard to play games that use the L2, R2, L3 and R3 buttons a lot as well.

What I want, is the exact opposite. Load up your PSP, then play the game Via the PS3 with the PS3 controller. Would make playing nearly every PSP game much easier, and would allow you to play more comfortably as well. hands won't get as cramped as easily, and you could sit back in your chair, instead of being hunched over. I really hope that would be possible, but I have no clue if it is or not.

[rainless]

Does the TI-83 use USB? Or does it have the headphone jack looking connector? If it isn't an actual USB jack, then it simply won't be possible to port the hack onto it.


Another small update...

People found a way to remote play *ANY* PS3 game on your PSP. You backup the game to the internal or external HDD, use the PS3FTP and grab one file from the game folder, and edit a part of it, then throw that edited file back into the game folder. Mount the game, then use remote play on your PSP, and load the game.

I have no idea how well it works, since I haven't tried it yet. Would also be hard to play games that use the L2, R2, L3 and R3 buttons a lot as well.

What I want, is the exact opposite. Load up your PSP, then play the game Via the PS3 with the PS3 controller. Would make playing nearly every PSP game much easier, and would allow you to play more comfortably as well. hands won't get as cramped as easily, and you could sit back in your chair, instead of being hunched over. I really hope that would be possible, but I have no clue if it is or not.

You can already do that with psp games downloaded from PSN (some of them at least... and obviously all of the PS1 games.)

Some games require the PSP and some you cam just play on the ps3... and if you have them on either system you can just download them to the other.

[zexmarquies01]

You can already do that with psp games downloaded from PSN (some of them at least... and obviously all of the PS1 games.)

Some games require the PSP and some you cam just play on the ps3... and if you have them on either system you can just download them to the other.

But many games aren't on PSN. Kingdom Hearts on PSP is not, and will not be on the PSN. Disney has stated in the past that they DO NOT WANT their games digitally distributed.

Also, I don't buy console games digitally. I tend to sell them later on after I beat them, or after they collect dust for a while. Since I can't re-sell PC games, I'll usually get a game wherever it's cheapest. But digital is a no-go when it comes to console games for me.

[Turd Furguson]

Anyone done anything new with this?

[DBZ]

There is too many to list, check out psx-scene and you will some idea of it.

[Turd Furguson]

There is too many to list, check out psx-scene and you will some idea of it.

I noticed this also.

[MattNo5ss]

Woah! I can't believe I haven't noticed this thread until now :shock:

Unfortunately, I can't see any of the links at work, but if I can get this to work, then I'll be buying a bigger HDD than the 160GB WD Scorpio Black already in my PS3.

I'm assuming there are guides on how to get this working in some of the links I can't see.

[DBZ]

Just do a google of psx-scene and it should point you in the right direction.

Honestly, I got one of the ps3key and the most I've done with it was see if I can make it work with my ps3 or not. Been playing on my 360 mostly now, maybe when they make it so its backward compatible with ps2 then it will pique my interest again.

[MattNo5ss]

From what I've read on psx-scene, this only works if you have system firmware 3.41 or lower. Sony has blocked its use in later firmwares, and there's no update yet...

Looks like I'll have to wait...