Happy New Year to everyone!  This last year was a pretty crazy year in regards to technology, gaming and being a geek.  Today’s post will be a personal recap 2007, and what i thought was the biggest trend from it.

2007: The year that gaming really went mainstream?

2006 yielded an estimated 12 billion dollars in revenue for the video game industry however 2007 could end up being an even better year.  This year we saw the X360 sales thrive (not counting japan of course) w/the release of much the anticipated Halo3 (which itself set a record for most copies sold on release for any media; movie, music, game).  We also saw gaming go mainstream with the help of the casual gaming system, Nintendo’s Wii (ie money printing machine, hehe).   Sony’s PS3 also started to pick up steam in sales with the price drops and release of two new models; however the PS3 was/is still trailing the pack in sales but has seemingly helped the next-gen format war for blu-ray vs. hd-dvd (x360 did not include the hd dvd, optional drive vs sony making blu-ray a requirement in the ps3).

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fanboy, blogging, Zune, launch, ds lite, life, x360, iphone, osx86, ps3, wii, opinion, gaming, linux, hardware, applications, console, culture, geek, handheld, apple | 2 Comments »

just recently two huge breakthroughs were made in the PSP underground/hacking world.  Noobz and Archaemic found an exploit in the game Lumines that basically allow all PSP firmware versions (1.5 to 3.50) and allow it to run homebrew.  this is a pretty huge find, so much so that for a few days Lumines sales on amazon exploded, at one point its sales were up 5,700%! whoa.

however, this is not the first instance that a game exploit/buffer overflow has been the entry point for hackers into a gaming console.  with the xbox there came to be a way to softmod it via a hacked game save file, i believe the game used was mech assault. 

the gamecube also had a game hack too, that game was phantasy star online. it allowed users to even put linux on the gamecube.

so i’ve always wondered, do developers purposedly leave the rare exploit in their code in hopes to drive their own software sales due to the exploit? even though the console maker and other software makers may not like the idea, it really seems to be plausible thought.  one that i am sure that most devs would ever speak of. 

anywho, i also see that the iphone activation has been hacked, DVD Jon has figured out a way to emulate the apple activation servers, however you will not have any cell phone abilities (but give this some time, once the sim card lock has been broken, a combination of this hack and a future one could allow those non-cingular/att users to have actual working iphones; not saying it will be me but ya never know.. i like a good hack!).

peace

wii, culture, geek, handheld, ps3, fanboy, osx86, xbox, ds lite, console, applications, windows, web, hardware, mac, gaming, psp, modding, mobile, vista, pc | 1 Comment »

well, as many or most that read my blogs may notice is that well, i’ve swayed to the nintendo-side these days. my sleek black ds lite had replaced the psp on my morning commutes since its battery life is superior to the psp and the wii purchased on launch day.

however my ds lite has been sitting on my desk while my PSP steals the glory/spotlight again due to me updating the firmware w/Dark_AleX’s 3.10 OE firmware and getting my old PSone games on it!!

recently, Sony has decided to dust off its PlaystationOne games library and in turn is releasing PSone games to play on the PSP (downloaded from your PS3). the funny thing is that a homebrew PSone emulator was released about two weeks prior to Sony’s official emulator. like nintendo’s virtual console, game selection is a bit small and limited. however, what if your like me and actually still have your PSone game discs; can i convert these games over?

the answer is YES! however it will require a few steps to do and also a custom firmware (Dark Alexa 3.10 OE-A’ firmware). here’s a VERY quick run-through on how to do this:

here’s what applications/utilities you will need:
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ps3, fanboy, ds lite, wii, culture, gaming, psp, console, hardware | 18 Comments »

well, this weekend i had set aside for all of my recent geek projects/purchases.  lets see what was on the agenda: new hd/redo system storage scheme, get new DS One flashcart working, setup Vista, setup/tweak my snowboard, and of course get a blog in.

 my new harddrive project seemed to take up most of the weekend since i was redoing my whole partition/storage scheme.  redoing my scheme required me to basically setup my partitions on the 500GB first, install XP to my first partition, then hook up the rest of my drives and then one by one, backup the data to the 2nd and 3rd partitions on the new harddrive, then format/repartition the old harddrive, and finally copy data back to respective partitions.

this took me about a day to do (moving over 700GB of data manually is probably in my top ten of boring computer tasks) but was well worth the time.  My current drive/partition setup is as such:

-Disk1 (500GB), 3 partitions for XP, Vista, Ripping
-Disk2 (300GB), 2 partitions for files, games
-Disk3 (250GB), media files, my documents
-Disk4 (200GB), dedicated entirely to storing of Ghost images of my setups (so glad i made a Live Ghost Boot CD!)

vista seemed to run and load much faster on my new drive (has a 16mb cache vs my prev having only 8mb caches; i remember when most drives only had 1mb or 2mb caches, those must really seem slow these days).  the maxtor drive is a sata300 drive but my motherboard’s sata controller is only a sata150; so i’m not getting the ideal speeds at all but still access times are good. 

i did my first real vista install today since i plan to run both that and XP SP2 on my main box.  my first few boots w/vista were interesting since i had installed nero 7 right away and it seems that nero 7 has an issue w/vista or the version i had did.  so i went online and found a micro and lite version of nero (made/customized for Vista), check it out over here:  http://web10.hotel450.server4you.de/index.php  install the micro version to get almost every feature, the lite is for basic burning only.

also used several tips from tech rx in getting my vista setup and adobe reader going.

after finally getting my XP Prof and Vista dual boot setup done, off to tweaking the snowboard. 

just got a new 2005 Burton Cruzer from REI for a pretty good deal. After riding some very sweet setups at the demo days at Spirit Mt, i decided that i had to actually spend some money for a brand name board. my current board is a cheapy, generic one.  the K2 and Burton setup i rode was beautiful, if not a bit scary.  i would consider myself to be a more aggressive freestyle rider, i love to go as fast as i can at times; however the k2 and burton setups it seemed almost hard to slow down or keep at a casual not screaming pace.  i had no problem w/the tougher, uneven terrain (a key thing for me since my face plant).  Last year i was up at Lutsen in northern MN snowboarding w/a bunch of my skier pals.  we hit up a pretty fast blackdiamond and i hit it too hard and did a faceplant going about 30mph.  not a fun weekend! since that wipeout i’ve been a bit on the softer side and also reason why i got my new board. 

one thing that amazes me with snowboarding is the level to which it has risen.  i started riding way back in 1994, so i’m pretty experienced (i’m a carver more than a jumper or pipe) and i remember my first board.  it was an airwalk 120 (started riding pretty small boards at first) and didn’t have any of the quick release stuff or pads or anything.  i look at my latest board and the level of customization with it and it amazes me.  today i removed and adjusted the bindings (Morrow bindings).  the bindings can basically be taken fully apart and adjusted in almost each aspect.  pretty crazy i’d say!  well, got my new setup so we’ll see how that holds out next weekend at my parents.

and the final project, my new DS Lite homebrew cart.  i decided to go and get a new DS One SC slot 1 card since my current SuperCard MiniSD is good and all, but sticks out a bit at the bottom.  plus, the DS One is a super key also so no firmware upgrade needed.  got it working but have been having some probs with the microSD card.  it seems i may have too slow of a microSD card, but we’ll see after i play aroud a bit more.  

hoping to get my laptop power cord in (got from a pal that declared it dead, dead? never! hehe, popped a new 60gb hd in it so we’ll see if an OS installs or not) and my Wiimote skins in.  i broke down and got 4 different ones from http://www.decalgirl.com   and hopefully my fourth and final wiimote i got off ebay will come soon too!

peace out

culture, htpc, ds lite, life, applications, modding, hardware, windows, vista, opinion, general gadgets | 1 Comment »

yes, i feel a bit sad some-days for him. since my ds lite purchase, my psp has sat dormant and charging on his charging cradle. i remember getting my psp on the US launch date and drooling over his amazing 3d graphics and gorgeous display.  but after a few weeks he started to get less and less attention and more gripes (dang battery life! where are the games? not another FPS!) however, it seems things might be changing soon.  it appears that some good games are starting to show up on the PSP (MGS: PO, Lumines II, goode ole GTA) and tempting me to make a purchase. for a while there i had given up on the PSP and its game lineup, which sony seemed to have too.  things seem to look a little brighter (mind you nintendo ds game/hardware sales are still killing the PSP in most regards).   

however, things looked even brighter than ever for the hacker/modder community w/the anonymous release of the PS1P Alpha 1 PS1 emulator (source DCEMU )!  i really have always wanted to play my Final Fantasy VII on the go (and yes, i still own these games but no PS1, :(  ). 

again, i do not promote piracy or warez but this is an amazing accomplishment for any coder/hacker.  sony has not even itself come up with a valid solution or even a proof of concept (at least i have not ran across any demos of an actual PSP running a PS1 game, however its promised now w/the PS3 but a pretty steep start-up cost for most). 

i personally have refused to upgrade my PSPs firmware and still run the same launch firmware, v1.50 which allows me to run every piece of homebrew software available.  after playing through my launch psp titles, i got into the homebrew/emulator very early scene and released a compilation of the best emulators available w/custom icons (seamonkeyPack, most of the time emulators were either only v1.00 ready and or did not have any cool icons or had the kxploit icons). 

the psp’s homebrew history is never-ending battle type story with hackers finding exploits and sony releasing firmware updates to fix them (see wikipedia entry on psp homebrew).  it started w/a coder running a very simple helloworld type app on his psp firmware v1.00.  the next coder then ran the same app on a v1.50 psp by using what would become known as the swapploit.  basically you loaded a folder on your main ms duo card and then the emulator/homebrew eboot.pbp on a second ms duo and then once you selected the game in the PSP menu, you had to pop out the first duo card and put in the second, thus swapploit.  however in a mere matter of weeks, the hack was refined to using a two folder system on one ms duo card and was dubbed the kxploit.   later hacks w/firmware v1.51 and up included tiff exploits; the battle between unsigned code and sony was a constant fight.  more dubious hacks were also made such as running PSP iso images of games/movies off of a ms duo card and even making your psp run w/later firmware to avoid having your psp’s firmware updated to play newer games (you bought).  i did that for GTA since i loved having my (of course!) mario allstars and chrono trigger (snes) on the psp.  

in my opinion, the psp was a born portable emulating system (PES, haha!) just by the raw power in it (333mhz cpu, comparable to a ps2s) and the amazing screen it was given.  however, this lead up brings me to my next prediction in for gaming (a pretty obvious one too): the PS3 will become the hackers/modders next fave system to hack (even more so than the xbox was, i modded mine!)

its obvious since it already can have Linux installed onto it.  hackers have already dumped a blu-ray game to iso via linux and a basic command line.  it is a mere matter of time before someone figures out how to run iso dumps from their PS3’s harddrive.  in my opinion, i think nintendo purposedly went with a smaller internal size to avoid having such problems that the xbox then and ps3 now may have w/game piracy.  one cannot fit a full wii game onto a SD card (since i think the wii only sees up to a 2GB card) or internal memory (512mb).  however usbs could be a different story if its only activated by a firmware update and can take hds. 

also, from (what i dub as..) the ‘next-gen’ handheld war, it seems pretty obvious so far that games sell systems more than power and specs.  its sad that the reason i will be dusting off my psp and putting the ds lite to rest is not for a game being released but a homebrew emulator.  but my psp will take whatever loving he can get it and my ds any rest she can get.

so this upcoming console war could be a good one for everyone including the hackers/modders of the world and us consumers with so many choices.  i have already made my choice; Wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!! 

culture, geek, wii, ps3, ds lite, fanboy, handheld, console, gaming, hardware, psp, opinion, modding, general gadgets | 2 Comments »

well.. finally got my superpass key and supercard minisd for my ds lite in! hehe..

been reading up on it for a while now and realized i was overanalyzing how it works! very easy.. just run my homebrew through the nds homebrew patcher and voila! DS Lite ready!..

first thing i did was to flash my DS Lite’s firmware using Flashme.. that way i don’t need to carry my SuperPass Key around to use it.. plan to keep my phoenix wright in the slot to have w/me or brain age..

flashing went well. .prob the easiest firmware flash of any device i’ve done.. xbox mod chips being the hardest (back before cromwell.. good ole winLPC.. ).. took only a few minutes, 15 seconds to actually flash it..

found a few public domain roms and ran them through the supercard app and loaded up on my 1gb miniSD card.. popped er in and loaded fine… foudn out the supercard miniSD has built in emulators for NES, GB, and SMS.. so i threw a few NES roms on and played fine..

so far i’m pretty happy w/my investment.. also can now add the DS Lite to my ever growing list of hacked/modded devices.. hehe.. i guess you could say i have a dream handheld gaming setup w/my PSP on v1.50 firmware and my DS Lite w/SuperCard.. hehe..

anywho.. off to bed for me.. not so sure if my guide for the DS lite will be as indepth as i originally thought.. might be just a here’s what the SuperCard is and how the UI looks.. (two things that took me a bit to figure out and actually having the supercard to see)..

and finally.. just some quick website stats.. i love stats.. hehe..

hoping to hit over 200,000 unique visitors this year.. or the goal..

ds lite, fanboy, modding, hardware | No Comments »

well.. went out and did a side job of setting up a home theater system for a co-worker and got some extra cash for it.. so i went out and splurged on a few DS games (Big Brain and Mario Kart DS) and decided to check my paypal account and what do you know! all of my money from the whole non-shipped phone was back in my account!

sweet!! guess my bank must have pressured paypal or the user got money in is account.. anywho.. w/that extra cash, figured i’d get myself a nice batch of DS lite addons and also started looking into the homebrew scene..

after finally figuring out a combo of what i needed to get homebrew to work, bought a SuperCard Mini-SD and Superkey combo for my ds.. didn’t want the latest cuz it uses Micro SD memory vs mini sd that i have… (the SuperCard Lite = micro sd, remember that!)

so once i get that all figured out, i’ll add a section to the site on homebrew.. got a bit lazy recently sorry for no updates..

ds lite, applications, modding, gaming | No Comments »

well… i’ve been VERY closely following almost anything thats related to Nintendo’s latest console, the Wii (pronounced we )… and have been pretty dissatisfied w/my Sony PSP and Sony in general (in the gaming realm that is, still a phone/camera fanboy.. hehe..) so i said the heck w/them and put the PSP on the dock and went out to gamestop and got a shiny new Onyx DS Lite (gotta match w/all my other toys!)….

at gamestop at the Mall of America (live like 10minutes from it.. ), was talking w/the store manager as i was buying it and ended up not getting Brain Age (used copy was not in), and got the New Super Mario and Phoenix Wright..

the latter game i had never heard of but the manager gave it HUGE raves and also mentioned that they got only 2 copies of it since its been released and had one left on reserve (guess a worker there put it on reserve a month ago but never bought it).. so we’ll see how that is.. i figure its a fitting game for me since its a lawyer/trial/courtroom based one.. 2 of my pals are going to law school next year so hell, gotta have something to talk about eh? hehe..

also put down $5 to pre-order Children of Mana.. so pumped for a new mana game!!! i still play secret of mana and secret of mana 2 on my psp using an snes emulator.. realized that i am going to be using my DS Lite for actual real games and my PSP for emulation/homebrew and also the occasional ‘backup’.. hehe.. i’ve tried every PSP game so far and have yet to really be psyched or addicted to.. however, Children of Mana might do that and Final Fantasy 3 (original 3, not the USA FF3 we got.. that was actually FF5 i believe..)..

so far, i love the look the DS Lite. very smooth! hopefully we do see a black Wii, cuz i white would just offset my whole decor/color scheme.. hehe.. oh well.. i guess ying and yang (wii/ds)…

off to the new mario!! looks pretty fun..

ds lite, culture, console, gaming | No Comments »