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HappySqurriel on 09 January 2008
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Morgyn said:
HappySqurriel said:
 

"Easy" to pirate is a very relative thing ...

  • The PSP and Dreamcast required no hardware modifications, and everything you did need was available at most stores that sold the systems.
  • The DS and Gameboy required people to buy products from somewhat untrustworthy websites
  • The XBox, Playstation and PS2 required you to buy a product from a somewhat untrustworthy website and modify your hardware
  • The Gamecube required you to buy a product from a somewhat untrustworthy website and either use a very expensive disc medium (8 cm DVD) or buy a case mod.
  • The N64 required you to buy a very expensive add-on for your system.

 


 These are not accurate, and trust me I have a lot of experiance here.

 

In order of ease. 

Dreamcast: No modification, just a modified image of the CD.

PS2: No modification: Using the HD adapter and a Disc you could easily buy from a website. 

DS & GBA: No modification. Requires a flashcard and a card reader built for the DS. 

N64: No Modification. Zip drive expansion unit.

Genesis, SNES & NES: No Modification. Floppy drive unit.  

Xbox: Exploitable savegame and put it on a memory card. It made modifications to the harddrive and was very easily recoverable if it went wrong. 

PSP: Firmware flash for which you need an expliotable image. Which if done wrong, will brick your PSP and leave it useless and requiring expensive hardware to fix.

Xbox360: Drive firmware flash. Involves taking 360 apart and attatching drive to pc. Dodgy firmware required. 

Saturn: 2 wires + replace  DVD ribbon.

Playstation: 4 wire mod

Gamecube: 5 wire mod, Easy install, requires a replacement case to take full size DVD, but as you've taken it apart to install the mod...

Wii: 5 Wire mod. 

PS3: as yet you can't

Every single method requires you to go to a website and trust it. Bad firmwares can brick your console, or they can steal your money. Each one aquiring the software or hardware is as dodgy as each other, the only risk beyond that is your own installation. Which I've detailed in increasing difficulty above.

The PSP is by no means the easiest to mod, its about middle ground in my book. If you have good soldering skills, it's almost one of the riskiest.


Many of the softmods and swap techniques were developed later in the system's life ...