question on PS2 modding/swapmagic

[Atreides]

Well, I've had a modded PS1 for a looooong time, bought it off a friend in college who was moving in with a friend who already himself had a modded ps1, and now I kinda worry that the thing is slowing down. Certain burn games go to the PS1 screen and don't load without 5-10 resets, and most recently I've had major problems with the ISOs of Legend of Dragoon I've come across not having music during cutscenes. So I'm pretty sure it's on its last legs.

I realize I can emulate through my PC, but I figured it would be better for me in the long run to buy a cheapish slim PS2 and mod that, so I could play all my old PS1 games as well as PS2 burns.

So yeah, a few questions:

1) For someone with no experience with electronics/soldering, is installing a modchip on a slim/fat PS2 that difficult? Is one easier than the other? Or should I forget about it and go with a different solution?

2) Is swapmagic that big of a pain in the ass?

3) Does either method have drawbacks/downsides?

4) Is there another option that I'm not taking into consideration, excluding modding a ps3 or finding a ps2 fat with HDD? I know some ps1 mod devices just plug into the extension port on the back, but I don't know if they have these for ps2 or if they're any good.

5) Anyone know of a reputable site for purchasing one of said solutions?

That's about it really, obviously I do not condone piracy etc etc, and this is all to play my own backups of games I legally own and things like that etc etc.

Thanks!

[viperlasson]

Modchips are not needed for PS2 modding anymore. Look into Free McBoot. It's a hack that someone installs on your ps2 memory card and lets you load homebrew like, ESR, HDLoader, NES, SNES, and genesis emulators, ect...

Look here, [READ FIRST POST!][Free Service!]I can install fmcb for you! - PSX/PS2/PS3 Scene Newz , its a huge thread that people offer to mod your memory card for you (for free of course). You just mail them your card with return shipping. My person was really quick, took about a week using USPS snail mail from IL to LA. I reccomend a fatty with hdd since you can just install iso's onto that hdd and use hdloader to run them. No disks, no patching, no burning, very easy and simple. ESR loads your brunt disks (your isos have to be ESR patched, theres some gui that does it).

[Atreides]

so once you have the mcboot thing loaded to your memory card you just pop in a burn disc (if you're using a slim) and itll work?

I was under the impression PS2 HD's are kinda pricey on ebay or whatever, plus I have a really bad track record with my ps2 fats breaking, although I guess you can just move the HDD to another one.

also, will I have to reburn my PS1 games with that, or will it just work?

[Darus Grey]

so once you have the mcboot thing loaded to your memory card you just pop in a burn disc (if you're using a slim) and itll work?

I was under the impression PS2 HD's are kinda pricey on ebay or whatever, plus I have a really bad track record with my ps2 fats breaking, although I guess you can just move the HDD to another one.

also, will I have to reburn my PS1 games with that, or will it just work?

The "official" PS2 HDD is just a standard IDE HDD. You can put (most) any IDE HDD in it.

I have a random 200gb and 500gb one that work fine, also fats are a lot less likely to break when you're never actually using the laser. But yeah, once FMCB is loaded, you can just run burned discs, or launch HDloader, or dozens of other programs.

[Atreides]

how exactly do you get isos on the HDD at that point?

Can you use a USB flash drive to transfer them, or will the ps2 not pick it up?

edit: anyway yea, I'm a little concerned as playing CDs on fat ps2s seems to make the laser break down faster, and that's what all my ps1 games are on, but I guess I can just reload the isos to the HDD.

If the FCMB is on a memory card how can you save games onto a memory card? Does FCMB work from slot 2?

[viperlasson]

the hack takes up most the space on the standard 8mb sony card, so you'll have to buy another for game saves. I keep it in my 2nd memory slot and its fine there. As grey said, you can use any IDE hdd HDLoader, you just need a fatty ps2 and the network adapter. To load the ISOs onto that hdd you need to hook the hdd up to your computer through an IDE + power cable and use a program called WinHiip (SKS Apps - Exploit Systems - Wii Ps3 Ps2 Apps - Homebrew Game Downloads) to format / install isos to the drive.

oh yeah a note for western digital drives... try to avoid them as they require a little tinkering with the network adapter in order to fit properly.

[Aevis]

freemcboot + hdloader + big hdd = win i chipped my old ps2 fat back in the days + bought the network adapter to use a regular hdd, but the principle is the same. to copy isos, i simply plugged it into my pc through ide and used a tool which recognizes ps2 formated hdds in winxp. the transfer speed outweights the 2min hazzle of getting the hdd out of ps2 + connect to pc imo (especially for multiple iso), but it might be different nowadays.

[Hiryo]

personally, i use the official ps2(ffxi) HDD, the retail version of HDAdvance, and Swap Magic 3. It's a pretty old version of playing ps2 isos, as people now have easier methods of doing it, but I don't feel like making the changes. If you have a fat ps2 and want to try using swap magic then I recommend you to search youtube videos on making ps2 slide tools. I dont know if the latest versions of swap magic still require manual disc swapping, but what you used to have to do was slide the locking mechanism on the disc try and manually put in the disc. It's actually very simple to do, I have 3 fake slide tools sitting on my ps2, all made of polystyrene blister packaging.l

The benefits of using the HDD over stuff like swap magic is
A.) Of course, wont have to swap discs every time you want to play something,
B.) Faster load times on many games
C.) Less discs you have to keep laying around :D !

But playing games on the HDD DOES have drawbacks. As far as I understand, unless you use the new freemcboot(and I still dont know if it works yet) will not allow you to boot PS1 games from a hard disc drive because of the way that ps1 games load on the fat ps2's. Also not all ps2 games will work when booted from the HDD. A common glitched game is Kingdom Hearts 2, wherein you can not enter any gummi ship activities because of the way the information is supposed to be loaded off of a disc. I'm sure you can find others that are the same. I'm currently having trouble with fatal frame 1 but i think its because the torrent was poor quality lol

This is the site I use, it's pretty up to date on the ps2/psp scene and isn't overloaded by 293478932kids who want to hack their older brother's system. Don't know if its the best site currently on the net but I havent had any issues yet

SKSapps homepage
SKSapps PS2 forum

[Hiryo]

freemcboot + hdloader + big hdd = win i chipped my old ps2 fat back in the days + bought the network adapter to use a regular hdd, but the principle is the same. to copy isos, i simply plugged it into my pc through ide and used a tool which recognizes ps2 formated hdds in winxp. the transfer speed outweights the 2min hazzle of getting the hdd out of ps2 + connect to pc imo (especially for multiple iso), but it might be different nowadays.

I also have the ide cable but I havent used it in a LONG time. Last time I used it was to put HDloader on my HDAdvance(lol) but then I couldnt use ps1 games to boot my hd loader, so it only worked for about a week Typically I burn dvds with DVD Decrypter then put upload it on HDAdvance. I don't know why I didnt bother trying to manually load it with my IDE...then maybe my fatal frame would work.

To OP: IDE to USB cables can be pretty cheap(if you didnt already know). I got one off ebay for 6 dollars and an HD power cable for 12. I bought the retail version of HDAdvance for 10 dollars and swapmagic3 from play-asia.com or something for 15. Stuff isnt too terribly expensive and kinda pays for itself in a couple of uses.