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What is CFW?

Custom Firmware is a firmware modification to your PSP. It allows several additional features over the Official Sony Firmware.

For the purpose of this guide, the CFW will be Dark-AleX’s M33. Currently the most popular CFW.

What does it let me do?

Loads of things!

A few of the numerous features it can allow are:

• Being able to run UMD games from the memory stick.
• Possibility to launch Homebrew games and Applications.
• Ability to change how the PSP behaves. (e.g. Removing Sony logo when booting.)
• Add the ability to take screen captures.
• Modify the way your PSP looks.

What’s Homebrew?

Home written applications on games available for free on the internet. There’s tons of great games and useful programs out there to try, with a huge community of people interested in creating content.

How does it work?

By overwriting the Firmware stored on the PSP with new files. To do this, we need to load an installer from the memory stick. This can be done using a Jigkick (Pandora’s) Battery and a Magic memory stick.

Without going into too much detail. A Jigkick battery is a battery modified to have it’s serial number set to 0xFFFFFFFF. This tells the PSP to boot from the memory stick (if it contains anything bootable).

The Magic Memory Stick contains all the installation files for the Custom Firmware.

There are other methods of installing CFW, but they tend to be specific to PSP models and Firmware versions. This method should work for most current PSPs.

Is it risky?

If you follow instructions to the letter, then no. You should encounter no problems.

If something goes wrong (e.g. battery dies whilst installing), your PSP may be left in a non-working state.
Never fear! You should be able to restart the installation process without any problems though, making your PSP alive again.

If you don’t like your CFW, it’s easy to uninstall it using the same method as installing it.

That said… I take no responsibility whatsoever for what you do with your stuff.

Will I loose my saved games?

As long as you don’t format the Memory Stick with your saves on you’ll be able to play them afterwards without any problems. For this reason I suggest using a separate Memory Stick to use as your Magic Memory Stick.

You could also copy the contents of your Memory Stick to the PC before you begin, and copy it back afterwards.

When installing CFW, you will loose all the settings you have saved on your PSP (for example, your background, console name, wireless settings, so on).

Sounds good! What do I need?

Not too much.

• Some assorted free files from the internet.
• A spare genuine memory stick (512mb or more recommended) that you don’t mind formatting to make the Magic Memory Stick (I use a 1gb stick).
• A Jigkick Battery (Also known as a Pandora’s Battery).
• A PSP! This guide should work without issue on all Phat PSPs, as well as most Slim PSPs (This isn’t possible on the very new Slims as far as I know..) For the record, I’ve got a Slim PSP.

Where can I get a Jigkick battery?

• Buy off the internet or borrow one. A few companies make ready made versions. This is what I’m using.

• Certain batteries can be “soft modded” using Homebrew software on a Phat PSP (with CFW installed). I’m unsure on the details on this method, but google should help.
• If you’ve got 1337 soldering skillz, a spare battery and guts, you can try making your own. Again google or YouTube offer good advice.

Installation

This guide will currently install 4.01 M33-2 CFW. The latest version of the M33 CFW is 5.00 M33-4, which I will tell you how to update to later in the guide.

• Note: If you’re trying to install an earlier version, this may not work. Also note, you cannot install firmware earlier than 3.60 on a Slim PSP.

Step 1 – The files

First of all, we need the files that were mentioned earlier.

There are several different methods of making a magic memory stick. In this guide, I’ll be using an extremely user friendly installer.

We’ll need a copy of “PSP Grader v006 – Lite” to install all the files to our magic memory stick. Have a search on google, and you’ll be able to find it.

As M33 CFW is installed as a patch on the OFW we’ll need a copy of that when we install. As the latest CFW is 4.01, we’ll need the 4.01 Sony OFW. Available here.

• Note: (Remember to get 4.01, not 4.05. As 4.05 contains no big updates, a CFW doesn’t exist yet for it.)

Step 2 – The batteries

Fully charge them both! You don’t want them to die when you’re copying or installing do you?

Step 3 – Making the Magic Memory Stick

Make sure you have your proper battery in your PSP at this point, not your Jigkick battery.

You should have two files downloaded from earlier:

PSP Grader v006 – Lite Setup.exe
401.PBP

Insert the memory stick into your PSP (or a card reader), and then connect it to your PC via a USB cable (remember to turn it on and select “USB Connection” from the Settings column).

Run the installer for PSP Grader, and launch the program from the start menu.

A very simple installer.

• Press “Load eBoot” and navigate to the OFW you downloaded. (401.PBP)
• “Select Trigger Button” allows you to select a “safe” button that you need to hold down when booting your PSP in order for the installer to run. I didn’t bother with this, but you can if you want.
• Tick “Format Memory Stick” and make sure that the letter of your memory stick in my Computer is the same as that in the box. (We don’t want to format a hard drive accidentally.)
• Press the “Create Pandora Stick” button, and let it run it’s magic. It will take several minutes to copy everything.

When it’s all done, you’ll have a friendly “All done!” message in the popup box and you’ll have your Magic Memory Stick.

You’ll probably want to uninstall PSP Grader now. You won’t need it again unless you need to make another Magic Memory Stick (or you messed something up).

• Note: If you haven’t used a Genuine Memory Stick you might encounter problems. Check further down for instructions on how to tell what kind of stick you’ve got.

Step 4 – Installation on the PSP

First of all, turn your PSP off completely (as opposed to standby). Do this by holding the power switch up for three seconds.

Disconnect the PSP from both your PC, and from any charger you might have connected, and take the battery out.

Make sure your Magic Memory Stick is inserted, and place the Pandora’s battery into the back of the PSP.

The PSP should turn itself on, and you’ll be presented with the installer main menu with seven options (background colour is randomly generated, so don’t fret if it’s pink).

A quick rundown of what the options do:

• Install 4.01 M33 – Installs the M33 CFW onto your PSP.
• Install 4.01 OFW – Installs the Sony OFW onto your PSP.
• NAND operations – Take an image of the current status of your PSP or restore it. (can lead to problems if you have bad Memory Stick).
• Hardware Info – Displays system information.
• Test M33 – Boots a testable version of M33 CFW (not that useful as you won’t have anything on the Memory Stick to run).
• Shutdown – Shuts the PSP down.
• Reboot Device – Reboots the PSP.

Obviously you’ll want to select “Install 4.01 M33″ or you wouldn’t be reading this guide. You’ll get a progress bar telling you what’s going on. (Mainly formatting and flashing files).

When it’s all done, you’ll get a confirmation screen telling you to either shutdown or reboot. You’re free to pick, but at this point I’d shut down and reinsert your normal battery and Memory Stick.

The installation is all done at this point.

If you want to check it’s all gone ok, navigate to “Settings > System Settings > System Information” and check what the installed System Software is.

Step 5 – Optional post install stuff

Settings

• Re-enable the key tone. This installer disables the clicking key tone when moving around the XMB.
  Turn it back on with “Settings > Sound Settings > Key Tone” set to on
• Rename your PSP. At the moment it’ll be “Klutsh’s PSP” (he wrote the installer you used).
  Set it back to what you want with “Settings > System Settings > Nickname”.
• Obviously there’s loads more settings. I’d go through them and set them just as you would when you first bought your PSP. (Like sort out the wallpaper!)

Things to watch out for

• Obviously the CFW has it’s own built in settings menu. These are called the VSH menu and the Recovery Menu. You can find settings for adjusting the way the PSP behaves to some extent.You can access the Recovery Menu by holding down the Right Shoulder button when booting the PSP, and the VSH menu by pushing select on the XMB.
• The Slim cannot run the 1.50 kernal, so If you’re tempted to install, don’t bother (If this doesn’t make sense, don’t worry).

FAQs

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How can I tell if the Memory Stick I have is genuine or not?

The quickest way to get a rough idea is to see if it supports Magic Gate.

Highlight your Memory Stick and press the Triangle button, then select “Information”.

I already have a newer OFW installed. Is this a problem?

No problem. When the CFW is install we overwrite the existing OFW. You can go from any OFW past, present or future using this method.

I already have an older M33 CFW installed. How can I update?

• Note: You’ll need 3.52 M33-3, or higher to upgrade to a new version using this method.

Updates can come in two forms. Version updates (i.e. the version number will change.) and fix updates (patches to existing versions).

It’s always advisable to get the latest the latest patches for your version in my opinion, however you might not want to if you want to run a certain homebrew app that isn’t compatible.

First of all, you don’t need a Jigkick or Pandora battery to update your Custom Firmware.

Version updates

First of all, fully charge your battery (your normal one, we don’t need the pandora one remember!). The updater wont let you run unless your battery is above 78% charge, even if it’s attached to it’s charging cable.

If you are updating from an old version of the CFW (the version number in system information is different to what you want installed). You will need two files. The Sony OFW for the version you wish to install, and the Release M33 files for the version.

Both files are available on this page.

So, if we wanted to move up to 5.00 M33 (any other version will be the same apart from the file names), we would need:

500.PBP
500M33.rar

Open up the 500.M33.rar file and extract the “UPDATE” folder and it’s contents. Then copy this folder over USB to “P:\PSP\GAME” on your PSPs memory stick.

Next. take the 500.PBP file, and copy it into the “UPDATE” folder on the PSP. (If you’ve downloaded the 5.00 OFW from a different source, and it has a different filename, you will need to rename it to 500.PBP).

You should now have several files inside the “UPDATE” folder now. One of which is 500.PBP.

Disconnect your PSP from your PC and quit out of USB mode, and navigate to “Game > Memory Stick”. You’ll have an icon for the updater, run this.

Press the X button when prompted to run the updater. When it is finished, make sure you press the X or O button to reboot the console, or you could end up leaving it in an unbooting state (and you’d have to reinstall CFW again).

You can now delete the “UPDATE” folder and it’s contents from the memory stick as we’re done with them.

Patch updates

The M33 Patch updates are done in an almost identical way to version updates, the main difference being that you don’t need the OFW file, but you need to already be running the same version as the patch you’re trying to install.

For example, if we wanted to install the 5.00 M33-6 patch, we would need 5.00 M33 already installed.

Patch updates are available from the same place as the Release version, on this page.

Staying with 5.00 M33-6 as an example, we’d want to download the file 500m33_6.zip.

It’s mostly the same as before now. Extract the “UPDATE” folder, and copy it to “P:\PSP\GAME” on your PSPs memory stick.

Disconnect your PSP from your PC and navigate to “Game > Memory Stick”. Again you’ll have an icon for the update.

Run this the same as before, remembering to reboot the PSP using the X or O button when prompted.

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More to come!

If you’ve anything you’d like to add or ask feel free to submit a comment!