r/PSP

I recently bought a refurbished 1000. Been my dream handheld for years since I was a kid and I’m so ready and excited to mod it. Before the purchase I did some research and found some preferred the 1000 but others the 3000. Considering I’m on a budget I decided to go with the 1000 and was willing to take sacrifice in battery and RAM, but after going through with it, part of me feels like I should’ve gone with the 3k after scouring some discussions.

Is there much difference between the two to maintain this worry, and should I consider returning it?

Basically, I need help deciding because I would like an all purpose device for listening to mp3s, watching stuff sometimes, and playing the occasional game but I don't know if I should get a psp go or a ps vita. I am wanting to jailbreak/mod whatever I get.

I do have the internal storage in mind with each device.

I would love to hear anyone's thoughts/opinions

Just got a psp recently, a mint Japanese one, currently im trying to install ARK 4 without using a PC, the place that originally had it moved towards Ark 5 and i cant seem to find 4 anymore… anyone have any recommendations???

Hi, I have a question. I have a PSP 3000 running 6.39 PRO-B7, but it's not permanently installed, so every time I take the battery out, I have to reactivate it. Would it be possible to remove this custom firmware and install ARK-4 instead?

When i was little, i was given the choice between a PSP and a DS lite for a birthday gift and i chose the DS lite since i already owned a GBASP. I didn’t regret the choice(still don’t) but part of me in recent years started flirting with the idea about buying a PSP. It was always just a “what if”, leaning towards no until literally yesterday when a video of a psp go crossed my youtube feed and i got curious. Now i have a serious urge to get a psp..i just don’t know which would be best. Now to preface, i *do* have a vita running CFW and adrenaline, but i still haven’t gotten the hang of switching back and forth between it since it emulates the psp experience and it just doesn’t feel right either, so unless y’all think i should stick with it, here’s my dilemma:

For starters one thing that scared me off the most about getting a psp was that every time i passed this sub, i’d see horror stories of spicy pillows being a frequent problem with the thing. I heard about there being battery mods that can fix it but know nothing about them so it didn’t sit right.

The second thing that scared me off is that i heard UMD’s are extremely fragile and even if you do get them working fine, they are really loud and drain the battery terribly. I love physical media so that scared the shit out of me and while i’d love the concept of collecting physical discs for my hypothetical PSP, if it’s really that bad, i’d rather go with a modded go or maybe getting whatever model would cause the least issues and exclusively use it as cfw digital only. It’s not my preference (tho the go is super cool looking so it *deffo* helps) but i did the same with my vita once i got a 64 gb memory card only to find out the memory cards are actually extremely prone to failing and had to make the fairly easy choice of keeping use of my physical games while carrying a ticking timebomb for memory or sacrificing physical both for security and a lot more storage that is easy to replace. So if the UMD’s really are that bad, that might narrow my choices down.

That’s what i knew prior to yesterday, now here is what else i found out about recently/ am curious of and could help me make A decision, please clarify any misunderstandings or help me weigh the options for the following:

1: i found a video claiming that the spicy pillow problem i was so afraid of is actually a problem that mainly the 1000 model has from frequent play and was sort of fixed with the others (though one post prior to this claimed it was actually *not* playing the psp that causes the spicy pillow problem so i need clarification, but with this info it’s one point against the 1000.

2: i found conflicting claims on the umds, some claiming while the UMDs can be extremely fragile, it’s mainly the casings that are the problem and that they can be replaced easily enough while others said it’s the disc and that so much as a scratch can mess them up. Others still claimed it’s a combination of both, though the UMD’s themselves aren’t particularly expensive to get secondhand off ebay(old video claim) so that is *somewhat* reassuring. What’s more, i also apparently heard that when it comes to the UMD drives themselves, the 1000 can have issues if you’re not careful, didn’t hear anything about the 2000 other than some people think it’s less cool while others like it better and for the 3000 i heard there are actually multiple versions, some of which have major issues with their UMD drives making losing the ability to use them super easy. This whole thing scares me off the UMD’s pretty heavily and makes me iffy on how i feel about that for the 1000 and nervous about the 3000. But if i decide against umds then this literally does not matter. Yeah if they are actually still cheap it might be nice to collect them along side cfw downloads, but if the situation is really THAT bad, then saving money by going digital only with the go or whichever regular model works best might be better. Allows me to focus on getting physicals for my Gamecube and GBA.

3: multiple videos and comments saying that when it comes to CFW for the 1000 is apparently the easiest to work with but also it is the least powerful so i won’t get full mileage out of it. However, CFW for the 3000, despite apparently being considered the *best* PSP model and most powerful, it’s super risky because if it gets bricked…there’s no fixing it. Also some comment that said something about i think it was a pandora battery and adding it to a psp 3000 or any other foreign battery could permanently brick it? So that’s a point for the 1000, 2000, and Go(since i heard the go is also great for homebrew) and another against the 3000.

4: if i go the full digital route (or even if i don’t but ESPECIALLY if i do) i always like the most storage i can possibly get and i could not quite figure out how that worked for any of the models. The only thing clear to me is that apparently the max optimal storage size without performance loss is 128 gb, which is fine. I did hear tho, that the go is a pain in the ass to expand storage for, it requiring (i think) a hard to do mod (which i can just hopefully Buy a premodded version, no big deal i guess. Tho i’d need clarification non how swapping out storage sizes works).

If full digital is the best route i’d REALLY prefer the go because the sliding gimmick is really fucking cool and it being pocket sized, but if getting it premodded is too hard/not worth it, i’d like to be pointed to the best of the main 3

5: as previously mentioned i heard battery mods are a thing, with whatever a pandora battery is (haven’t looked into it since idek which one i want and i did this in thr middle of the night). And there’s even an option to mod your psp to use a vita battery (which is great considering my vita has lasted several years without needing a new one, not so great cuz i’m terrified of having to replace it.) how do these work? Can it get rid of the spicy pillows with different batteries and/or does rhe Go have to deal with it?

6: something I consistently heard is the psp 1000 is the most sturdy while the 2000 and 3000 sacrificed build quality for performance(and also can be docked to bigger screens). The 3000 being unable to be fixed if it’s ever bricked and apparently has screen issues along side umd drive issues and that pretty much makes it hard to consider even with the built in mic and best overall features. Also apparently modding the storage of the Go makes it more fragile allegedly. If i’m going to choose one of the og 3 i am leaning more towards the 1000, 2000. This is me asking y’all to clarify the go and 3000 situation

Overall: I’m still leaning heavily towards the go but the storage dilemma will make or break the argument for it, so if that doesn’t work out, i’m kind of leaning towards the 1000 or 2000 since from the hearsay i’ve seen, despite being apparently “the best” the 3000 has a LOT working against it. I’m not opposed on being sold on it though if clarification of the above can clear my doubts but if it is true that it getting bricked is impossible to fix and it can be caused by using different batteries, it’s not going to even be considered. So with all this in mind, can y’all help better inform me/clarify the stuff i mentioned/any stuff i miss to help me decide which model is best for me and whether to go UMD or full digital? Or should i just learn to love my Vita’s Adrenaline?

My original psp got stolen when I was a kid but now I’ve got a new one, been ordering stuff off eBay in advance as well as looking through old shops.

So far I’ve got

Gow chains of Olympus
The bigs 2
Mgs peace walker
Twisted metal head on
Mgs acid
Silent hill origins
Hot shots open tee 2
Both syphon filter games
NFS game I forgot which one
Lumines
pirates!

Most of these didn’t cost me anything or cost very little. The psp my mom got off Facebook marketplace for me came with a ton of shit(she lives in a diff state).

I recently installed iso's for a few games I used to have many years ago and still have save data for on my memory stick, but they don't recognize the save files. It's not a huge deal, but I'm wondering if there's a solution for this.

Put another way, I used to own physical games, and the save data is still on my memory card (which I recently transferred to a MicroSD with CFW). ISO installs of the games I used to own are not recognizing the old save data. Is that because it's not the exact same game anymore? Games I still own and ripped for their ISOs are recognizing existing save data fine.