Topic: Your Modding Exploits

[Phil_A]

I've recently started down a bit of a path from when I stumbled on my original Xbox at my parent's house the other week, and did a quick google to see if it was possible to mod one without a chip. Turned out it actually was, using a somewhat arcane process involving a PSP and copy of Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell.

Now I'm looking into attempting a hard drive replacement as the OG Xbox one is tiny, which is a bit more involved - you basically have to hot-swap the replacement drive with the DVD drive while the console is running in order to format it properly, although thankfully this doesn't seem to be beyond my limited technical expertise

I've soft-modded pretty much everything I've owned since the DS, but this will be the first time I've really messed with the hardware side of things. It's exciting! I'm having to order Torx screwdrivers and everything.

Tell me of your mods, what have you done or are thinking of doing?

[Sonny_Jim]

Did a SuperCIC to my Super Famicom, that was a bit buttclenching.  You have to lift a tiny leg off one of the chips and hope it doesn't snap off at some point in the future.  Although to be fair I didn't use the fancy pants one I linked to, I just soldered in PIC I had.

Been aching to mod the PS3 for ages, but it's such a headmess.  So many different ways that only work on particular models.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I had a modded xbox but regrettably chucked it out.

I added a 50/60hz switch to my megadrive so I could play games a bit faster.

I softmodded my wii and can run games off a passport drive, I started playing Okami a while back.

[peanutbutter]

Been aching to mod the PS3 for ages, but it's such a headmess.  So many different ways that only work on particular models.

Bought a modded one a few years ago, tbh even the software side of it was such a pain in the arse I rarely touched it beyond when I need a 3D blu ray player. Got a modded New 3DS XL myself, Wii U (I generally use Dolphin instead tbh), PSP, Nook eReader...

Gifted a few modded 2DS and DSi to some friends at the start of the pandemic. Mario Party, Mario Kart, Clubhouse Games...
Rockbox on my mp3 player, obvs.

Saw recently you can now softmod the PS2? there's been a memory card thing for years but you don't even need the file on a memory card anymore iirc.

[Malcy]

Saw recently you can now softmod the PS2? there's been a memory card thing for years but you don't even need the file on a memory card anymore iirc.

I've looked into modding consoles before but it seems like a load of pissing about that I can't see being all that worth it especially when emulators are so much easier. Just looked into the PS2 thing and its laid out quite well here although still by using a memory card.

https://cheapergamer.co.uk/ps2-modding-guide/

I've got some games I would still play if the discs weren't unreadable at times so think I'll give it a go at some point soon.

[Malcy]

Realised it's a lot easier to just buy the Softmod memory card for the PS2 on Ebay for a few quid rather than farting about burning a DVD etc so going to do that instead.

[Phil_A]

Did a SuperCIC to my Super Famicom, that was a bit buttclenching.  You have to lift a tiny leg off one of the chips and hope it doesn't snap off at some point in the future.  Although to be fair I didn't use the fancy pants one I linked to, I just soldered in PIC I had.

Oof. Wasn't brave enough to attempt anything like that, I just bought one pre-modded.

Saw recently you can now softmod the PS2? there's been a memory card thing for years but you don't even need the file on a memory card anymore iirc.

I've looked into modding consoles before but it seems like a load of pissing about that I can't see being all that worth it especially when emulators are so much easier. Just looked into the PS2 thing and its laid out quite well here although still by using a memory card.

https://cheapergamer.co.uk/ps2-modding-guide/

I've got some games I would still play if the discs weren't unreadable at times so think I'll give it a go at some point soon.

I hadn't heard of this one and I'm surprised it works to be honest, as previous DVD-based mods have involved forcing the drive to open with a special tool. I think getting a pre-installed memory card is probably the best way to go, it's an almost entirely painless method of modding.

After that you've got a few options with regard to running games, you can burn them to disc or you can run them straight off a memory stick or flash drive, but the only problem is videos tend to stutter as the USB speed is so slow.

If you can get hold of an old IDE drive, you can stick one of those in the expansion slot (this needs the HD/Network adaptor that plugs into the back, though), or just use network sharing to stream games from a computer(what I'm doing currently).

[Malcy]

I read that streaming the games is a lot faster so that's probably the route I'll go down. Mostly wanted to do it to play Scarface: The World Is Yours again. Downloading a PC version of it now which is not going to be easy to get up and running apparently so reckon it would be much easier to do the mod to the PS2.

[Dex Sawash]

Put a bunch of driving lamps on my Lambretta and necked lots of drugs.

[Famous Mortimer]

I modded a PSP a couple of years back. It took me about an hour of following fairly strict instructions, after finding lots of other less good instructions online (I'm sure I linked them in a previous thread, should you wish to do the same). It worked a treat, but the second-hand PSP I bought was a bit knackered so I didn't use it for that long, just sold it to a mate.

[Gurke and Hare]

I modded my Amiga 500 so that it could have 1mb of chip ram instead of 0.5mb. - chip ram was kind of like the equivalent of graphics card ram - it could be accessed by the custom sound and graphics chips, as opposed to fast ram which could only speak to the CPU. One of the Amiga's custom chips - I guess to do with memory management - was called Agnus, and the updated version was Fat Agnus - if you had one of those you could get the full meg of chip ram, but only if you cut one of the tracks on the motherboard and soldered across two of the others.

This is it: https://lyonsden.net/upgrade-amiga-a500-1mb-chip-ram/

[Sebastian Cobb]

One of my mates had one of those athlon processors you could massively overclock just by using a pencil to join a couple of links on the top of the chip.

I removed the heat shield from mine to try and cool it better but it didn't end well. Still got it as a keyring somewhere.

[seepage]

Yes, it's stressing enough just plopping a CPU into the socket, let alone doing daft things like deliding one.