Thinking about modchips..

[GTR-33]

I have a SCPH30000 (Japanese) PS2 and I have always thought about modding it, but until very recently, I have always had a US PS2. I gave my little brother my US PS2 and realised I have NO WAY to play any of my US games. I am not about to ask him to give it back to me so I am looking for an alternative.

A friend on mine pointed me in the direction of the Swap Magic disk set and said to get a flip top case. Seems like it will work but I don't know about all of this swapping disks back and forth and someone told me too that it doesn't work with all games. It's also a pain finding the Japanese swap set outside of Japan. I heard it doesn't support mulit-disk games either.

Now enter the mod chip. From what I gather from finding this forum is that the chips will play all games without any disk swapping at all. Nice. Do the chips need updating? Will it play all games? I saw a PS2 SNES emulator. Will that work as well? I'm not really into playing burned games so that isn't really a factor in my decision. I'm just looking for something to break the region crap. I'm so glad that PS3 will be region free.

Is the Matrix the best chip? How does it compare to the other chips in funtionality? I have had this PS2 for some time, is the integrity of the system deminished or can I expect it to play for another couple years? I have heard that some peoples systems have suddenly stoped working after sometime. Is the DMS4 Pro a "better" chip or simply more expensive? My basic question is should I get the disk set or the chip?

[daisukejigen]

Go for the chip, as long as you can, or know someone who can, solder very very well. Its true swap magic doesn't work with all games. Many of the problem games can be patched, but not all. DMS4 (with Toxic bios/OS) has some features Matrix doesnt, like a built in HDLoader type deal. Out of the two, I think Matrix Infinity is a better deal.
If all you want is to play different region games you could go with an older chip, though the firmware won't be upgradable. I prefer to be able to flash with new bios just in case some new protection comes out, I won't have to worry about my chip becoming obsolete.
As for systems just stopping to work, if you play copies of games on poor media it can kill the laser. I've had a couple PS2, each undergone many many hours of use and never had a problem. As long as you take care of your system and don't feed it crappy media, you should be fine.

[GTR-33]

Thanks for the info. I think I might go with the mod chip.