What skills are involved/necessary to modify hardware such as the ps3?

[kyron35]

So I've been a casual gamer on and off for years as real life obligations permit, but I followed with interest the Original Xbox mod scene, and have been playing catchup with the PS3 jail breaking scene. After some of the articles I have read, I find myself interested in the general methods one would use to achieve a successful modification to hardware in order to make it do what you want, especially when that hardware has been secured using some method of protection. This doesn't have to be ps3 specific, it could be any piece of hardware that is more like a computer. I admit that it may be way over my head, but I would really be interested in any links or resources someone could provide, along with any of the required tools, in order to begin to learn something like that. I do not even know where to start. Hopefully this doesn't sound too stupid, I just am really curious and would be interested to learn as a possible hobby/challenge. Thank you in advance for your time.

Edit: Clarified what I meant.

[indirect76]

It kinda depends. If you want to actually modify the hardware then you are best to start studying up on basic electric engineering and circuit design. If you want to create software that will run on your PS3 then you will need to absorb some basic programming and computer science knowledge. Of course, these are the basic first steps. You will need to read and understand more and more advanced topics before you can apply what you've learned to the PS3.

http://psx-scene.com/forums/content/...utorials-1520/ - Here's a link to learn about developing software.

[LKJHGFDSA]

Eh, all the PS3 mods have been designed to be marketed to consumers. All of them are easy to do for the end user, such as simply plugging in a USB dongle and turning on the console. or there's the one where you gotta clip a chip onto the console's motherboard.
All easy stuff.

If you want to get started, you should pick up a service mode dongle/jailbreak dongle & an E3 Flasher I'd say.
That's pretty much the 2 entry points of hardware hacking on the console.
The E3 Flasher is the one I mentioned earlier where you gotta open up the console, the device is fairly new and I'm not sure if it's even shipping yet.
It basically flashes the onboard NAND chip, rewritting the firmware with another firmware afaik.
The dongle replicates an official service jig, putting the console into service mode & making it suggestable basically.
It's not really relevant anymore since after the dongle's use we got a custom firmware which can enable homebrew & backup support by simple loading an altered firmware to the console.
Some people still use the dongle, as the jailbreak before the custom firmware has some advantages, but yeah you can still check that out since it's a bit interesting.
Even though the dongles have been disabled since some time last year.

The flasher is available for order on lightake.com, the dongle however judging by the 2 sites I checked doesn't seem to be in circulation anymore since it's a bit irrelevant.
I'm sure you'll be able to find one if you wanted to though, plus they're only about $5 a pop last time I checked.
You'll need to a console from last year to get anything out of the dongle too by the way.

You're probably more suited to the 360 modding scene if you wanna get your hands dirty.
Even that NAND flashing method is deemed useless by some.

[Greg0u812]

Thread for (what I consider to be) the ULTIMATE hardware mod for the PS3!
Wicked cool (PS3 Portable!!!)

[kavitha]

hi thanks for your information