A few weeks ago I wrote about taking a chance on a cheap “junk” PSP-2000 from Japan, replacing its faulty charging port, and ending up with one of the nicest handhelds I own.. One of many PSP’s I’ve bought though.
Quite a few people here on Lemmy reached out afterwards asking about jailbreaking, or just sharing that they planned to buy UMDs for it. I guess this article is my answer (or maybe just yet another thinly veiled excuse to write about my favorite old handheld…the PSP) to that.
Rather than another super technical wiki, I wanted to write a bit of step-by-step with just pictures of all of it. I cover installing ARK-4 custom firmware, setting up a microSD card, loading games, movies and music, a handful of homebrew recommendations. I really, really love Sony’s PSP. I think as far as industrial design language goes, you just can’t beat it.
So if you’ve recently picked up a PSP, are thinking about picking one up, or have one sitting in a drawer gathering dust, I hope this helps you give it a second life!
And if you don’t want to read through, then ask me here and I’m more than happy to recommend things to you.
I remember bricking my 1000 with an official update. It might be salvageable, I haven’t tried in years. I think my wife’s 2000 is still modded and working fine in a drawer somewhere.
I got a PSP 3000 in 2012 and jailbroke it. It was part of a long line of jailbroken portables:
DS Lite: 2010
PSP 3000: 2012
OG 3DS: 2019
OG Switch: 2024
Then I got a Steam Deck in 2025 and could run all of the games from those portables without having to jailbreak anything. Glad I got it while the price was reasonable!
My Steam deck is my go to emulation machine outside of ds/3ds. I still prefer to use my modded new 3dsXL for that. It’s been a long time since I broke that thing out though. More of a collectible at this point.
I have an old modded PSP 2000 from 15 years ago. Haven’t used it in ages but I have fond memories of emulating old pokemon games on it. Might boot up Pokemon Unbound to see how it looks.
Go get it out!
I think PSPs are super viable, even today. I use mine more than two of the retro handhelds I have which run 16GB of RAM. Looking forward to how you find it regardless though, after such a long time of not using it
I have an old PSP 2000 sitting in my closet that still works. This is a great resource man! Looks like I got another weekend project. 🫡
You’re welcome!!!
Have fun!
I just did this to a psvita last week. Sd2ps and pkgj are amazing
This can be done with any PSP. It is awesome.
Great post as always. That white PSP looks so slick compared to my crusty silver one… I’m jealous!
Thank you so much!
…mostly for turning a blind eye to what is obviously just a giant and elaborate excuse for me to write about the PSP again!!!
I got lucky buying this white one for roughly $33 USD :)
Don’t lament your silver though! They’re so beautiful, and all those marks it has just shows the history of it in your possession!
:)
Thank you. I have to break mine back out now. Last resource was wolo?..
That’s a name I haven’t thought about in a long time
Psp jailbreaking achieved perfect ease and reliability. It really is the gold standard… I’ll never sell mine, even though I use the steamdeck these days for a handheld.
Gives me hand cramps though (psp).
My wrist never really recovered from claw gripping my way though Monster Hunter Freedom Unite.
I used to have a PSP2000 that lasted me quite a bunch of years, hacked to hell back in the day. It was truly glorious. I’m now considering a Vita. It should be about as easy too, right?
They’re about the same now. You can do temporary or permanent. You can get a SD card adapter to not use their proprietary storage.
And then you can install all psp stuff done there too.
I traded mine in when I got a steamdeck, I went back to a PSP instead of a vita for it’s size. Just installed a usb-c charger mod on my psp2000 too.
Perfect, thanks! I might consider just emulation on the Deck, too.
I’ll recommend RetroDECK for emulation on the Steam Deck!
Yeah…I made a mess with these emulation center apps, and they’re all over the place now, with barely anything working. I’m considering a full reinstall, because there’s folders somewhere it still catches on during a reinstall.
Thank you for putting this all together! Any idea if the PSP-1000 would work with the same setup? I’ve got one collecting dust that I would love to try this with.
Yes, absolutely no difference! It works just the same :)
Excellent, you’re a gem!
You can even run GTA 3 (rebuilt in the Liberty City Stories engine) on your PSP-1000 if you’d be so inclined after jailbreaking!
I interviewed the folk behind it (Barcode Studia) a little while ago, and they made sure that not only was the game emulateable but playable on every PSP model, including the PSP-1000 :)
