Ps2 Scene History Lessons Part 2

[Jit]

Well heres another interview from us at Backupscene.com hope guys think its a good read This time we interviewed Team Ripper and the ever so popular ps2nfo.com


i would like to make something clear before any of you read this interview WE made the questions and THEY just simply answered them so we don't want this to end up like our last interview....


**Team Ripper**

What's your interest in the PS2 scene?

We respect the PS2 Scene very much. We love to see emulators poppng up,
mp3 players, mediaplayers all done by private people who dont earn any
money for it but do this all for fun and to gain respect of course. Keep
up this good work everybody!


Why did you develop ps2 modchips ?

Well, mainly it is for commercial reasons of course. We have the skills,
so why not use them to earn some money Smile And also of course we love
the challenge of hacking new protections and new ps versions.


Do You have any new modchips coming out for ps2 ?

We are not working on new PS2-Modchisp but we keep on improving the
Firmware of our Chip. Btw stay tuned for a very big update for Ripper3.2u!


Are you working on things for the psp ?

No, thanks to the easy way of downgrading the psp it's not necessary to
make any hardware modifications and so, not worth it spending any time
in developments. In case Sony will close the doors to the flash-bios for
ever we could think about having a closer look into the psp Smile


Do you know what the ps3 scene will bring us?

Well we are really looking forward to having closer looks into the PS3.
Let's see if Sony will implement enough security. And once the ps3
should be cracked we hope to see loads of homebrew stuff from the scene
again.


Is the ripper team going to develop a modchip for the ps3 if possible ?

In case the PS3 can be cracked, you can be sure we will develop a
modchip for it!


Any other things you would like to add in the interview?

We give shoutouts to the whole PS2 and Gamecube Community, to our
distributors, resellers, modders, everybody else who likes our modchips
and last but not least backupscene.com. Thanks for having us in your
interview!

**Ps2NFO.com**

Where did it all begin with the ps2 scene for you?

For consoles it began with PSX for us, then we moved on to Dreamcast followed by PS2.. basically aything that interests us is what we direct our Web site towards. Currently most of our attention is focused on PSP, as this is our primary area of interest at the moment anyway.


How did ps2nfo become one of the major players in the scene?

We have been around for many years, evolving with the times and for the most part carrying our visitors from one console to the next. We don't consider ourselves a 'scene' site though, just a Web site that reports news on console developments.


swap magic and flip top are one of the products team ownz came up with. will there be any other new developments along those lines? Maybe for the psp?

Unfortunately this is not true. Swap Magic is a product of Success-HK since its conception, and several companies mold the Flip-Tops which we'd like to believe we had a role in by communicating the idea for making them from our Web site members directly on our main news page a few years back. Once again, we are just a news site with forums like yours so any upcoming PSP products we promote will likely root from our sponsors or colleagues of theirs.


Hacking sony's dnas is something not many people want to step into (even well known dev. teams). What made you do it?

Unfortunately this is not true either. A guy by the nickname of NOID was the World's first to defeat DNAS and release an experimental Disk ID patch utility (and the source code to the NIP files it used) on our Web site forums before anywhere else, and as a result we mentioned it in our Site news. This is likely why people think it was 'PS2NFO' that beat DNAS, when in reality it was simply a visitor of our Web site. The same circumstances apply to the initial PSP dump news (done by the GODS @ Paradox)... we just reported on the news in such cases on our Web site as always.


Are there any new things to come for people with the ps2 v12? because they can't read the disk id utility and use machine id changer

Both have been done for many months by a famous release group, however, if and when the public gets to see them only depends on the guys who made them, and their decision to share such things publically. Do we have them? Sure! Will we leak them before we get permission to? Absolutely not! Why? Why upset the guys with the real coding skills in our inner circle Wink

More interesting is what we'll refer to as the "SB" for all version (including v12+) consoles. It is PC/PS2 client and server side software that allows you to run your PS2 images from your PC to your PS2 via Ethernet... the cool thing about it is the versions we've ran across include full source code, so the possibilities are endless with them in the hands of some talented coders. No word on a release of them yet though, maybe someday a group will leak them out though to revive the PS2.


People accuse you from stealing applications and other homebrew developments, then afterwards put your name on them. What's really true about this?

We have no comment on this accusation, sorry.


There have been apps, like zoneloader and paradox' machine id changer and disk id utility, they say you paid them to get it. Are these accusations true or false?

At one time we collected donations via our Web site for such things, however, in the end the funds donated were minimal and we have since removed the donation buttons from our page. All of the above applications were released, and yes at one point we did contribute ourselves directly to the talented individuals who created them to help offset the lack of donations. To this day we do support those who create and release applications via our Web site, with the more recent ones being UMDGen, the PPF File Analyzer, and some PSP EMU authors to name a few.


What do you think about the psp scene so far? will become bigger then ps2 scene?

To clarify, in this question we will define the "PSP scene" as the various PSP-related Web sites and some PSP release groups. This does NOT include our own Web site, nor ALL of the release groups of course. With that being said, the "PSP scene" appears very inexperienced based on what we're seeing elsewhere. Many Web sites are rampantly posting anything they get their hands on as "news" when most of the time it simply isn't news-worthy (again, you asked us OUR opinion in this question) and in some cases belongs on IGN/GameSpot instead of a self-proclaimed "PSP scene" site.

Also, the problem with some "PSP scene" release groups is they are complete dinks when it comes to packing or even labeling releases. For example, who started using WinAce to pack when WinRAR has been the standard for many 'scenes' and years? Additionally, what one group calls a PROPER may not be universally agreed upon by other groups. We won't mention any group names here, however, the 1GB MS is cheap enough (just over the cost of 1 single game) and thus all UMDRips should be made to fit that standard.. not 256/512MB sticks in our opinion, or at least not labeled a PROPER if made to fit the cheapass Memory Sticks. If you can't afford something that equates to the cost of about 1 PSP game, you shouldn't own a PSP at all! /RANT

As for if the PSP scene will become more popular than the PS2 scene, we believe it already has. The PSP is far simpler to run unsigned code (and back-ups) on than the PS2, and citing the past 10 months as an example, coders are a lot more eager to develop and port emulators to PSP than in the past with PS2. As more products are available for the PSP, we believe many more doors will open over this holiday 2005 season and the PSP will explode preceding the PS3 release.


What are your thoughts about the next gen, including ps3?

We're excited about the PS3, and already have many domains reserved specifically for it. The PS3 will most-likely be the last console we will cover before that nasty thing referred to as "Real Life" completely encompasses our free time. However, the estimated shelf life of the PS3 may be from 5-9+ years so saying 'GAME OVER' after PS3 could be quite some time from now.


Do you think team DMS is also team Toxic?
http://www.psx-scene.com/forums/showthread.php?t=26823
http://www.psx-scene.com/forums/showthread.php?t=28134

Without looking at the links at all, we can confirm the obvious- that DMS and Team Toxic are very close to one another.


What do you think about the drama with psx-scene.com and ps2hd?

It saddens us that xiaNaix even gave them the time of day in the past, but hopefully he will learn from his own mistakes. We know <G> is a bit younger and hot-tempered, but an old school scener like xiaNaix (who shares some mutual friends with us) should know better than to allow the nobodys that ps2hd is constructed of to gain any public attention at all. They are only homeless [k]idiots exiled from ps2nfo and ps2-scene. A word of advice: IGNORE THEM COMPLETELY and everyone will be a lot happier, and then we can have all the DMS freebies for ourselves. Now where is that new PSP product already A*****?! Smile


Why did you get rid of ps2ownz.com ? (it goes to ps2nfo)

We aren't using PS2Ownz as (like many Web sites) we don't want to wait until the last minute to get people used to not going to "PS2Ownz" for their news, but directing them to a more future-safe URL instead. By future-safe, we mean that someone (one of our competitors) has already registered PS3Ownz, so if we waited until this coming spring to switch when the PS3 is out, then we'd take a hit in traffic loss to them until the word spread of our new URL. At one point we even offered to buy the domain from them (TheTieger owned it at the time) for a few hundred bucks, but they were not interested and now we hear he sold/gave it directly to <G> instead. With that being said, we were planning to sell the domain, but when an offer couldn't be found to our liking we decided to redirect it to PS2NFO where it currently resides.


Do you think there will be a modchip for ps3?

It's too early to tell for PS3, however, there is a good chance if it's backwards-compatabile then someone will initially get PSX discs running on it via 12c508 or similar PIC chip or type of swap method (as was done with PS2), and then move up to PS2 CD/DVD back-ups with the ultimate goal being PS3 back-ups of course.

On a side note, we have heard some interesting rumors about an X-Box 360 mod already though... it will be interesting to see how far from release day one arrives, if it doesn't surface even sooner! Hopefully the guys involved will hold off until the initial release at least, as it would definitely be a disaster if news of a working X-Box 360 mod circulated to Mr Gates and M$ delayed the world-wide launch for fans everywhere... better to be safe than sorry guys! Wink

[thetieger]

why, why, and why would you post an interview that is mostly PS2NFO here? we could really care less what they have to say about anything.

At one point we even offered to buy the domain from them (TheTieger owned it at the time) for a few hundred bucks, but they were not interested and now we hear he sold/gave it directly to <G> instead. .

I did at one point have PS3ownz.com but now neither I nor G have that domain, it is however owned by someone who will rename nameless who has decided to point it towards PS3-Scene.org

so go visit www.ps3ownz.com

-Thetieger

[xiaNaix]

Personally, I thought it was very interesting. They have some valid points and it wasn't the usual bashfest you'd expect from them.