2. Can someone explain what the battery has to do with any of this? What's Sony's logic for putting programming code in the battery in the first place? I bet they have a good reason, but to us laymen it certainly seems odd.
Posted at 3:28AM on Aug 24th 2007 by Kenn Sebesta
3. Im not totally sure on this but its from what i have read around a few sites/forums.
The idea is that the battery would not only be something that most people wouldn't suspect (which up until recentally was true) but would also be something that could change the power levels going into the system to drop the chip into a debug mode allowing a more direct way of programming or flashing the main firmware chip.
To those with much better knowledge on this subject please do feel free to point out where i am wrong. This is just a very simple explanation from what i have read online.
With that being said. This is exelent. I have a bricked PSP motherboard just sitting right here...on my desk... Ill be getting a new cam this week and will make a pic/video tutorial on the process and post back with the location.
-Eureka
Posted at 3:49AM on Aug 24th 2007 by Hybrid
4. Bye bye bricked PSP prices, up you go now.
Posted at 8:36AM on Aug 24th 2007 by mastershake916
6. A lot of people are saying this method can be used to downgrade ANY PSP firmware to 1.50. Is this true?
Posted at 10:49AM on Aug 24th 2007 by tiuk
7. i think this is fake ive taken apart the sony battery after my psp got "accidentally" burned and all there is is a li-ion battery safety circuitry and a battery lvl indicator that adds resistance during the battery's drain (works like a motor controller) it has an eprom but theres no way it can be reprogrammed with the psp
Posted at 10:53AM on Aug 24th 2007 by alex mccown
8. I used this and it worked like a charm. I couldnt believe it at first but it works. It can downgrade any PSP firmware so far up to 3.52 as I know of. Though when you use this method I heard that it isnt a full 1.5 firmware so you have to update to like FW2.0 and downgrade to 1.5 again so you can get a full fw1.5. It also works for TA-082 and TA-086 motherboards and another thing your PSP doesnt need to be bricked to use this hack.
Posted at 12:55PM on Aug 24th 2007 by krazywhiteguy310
9. lol@alex mccown
Posted at 7:03PM on Aug 24th 2007 by hellscaper
10. If I remember correctly, Lithium ion batteries have control circuitry on the battery to help keep from over charging them, which could be pretty disastrous, thats why some batteries have extra terminals even though they dont supply a different voltage ;)
Are they reprogramming the interface? I thought those where read-only but guess not. And a few eeprom have voltage sensing to detect if its in programming mode or standard mode. unless I read that wrong.
Posted at 7:26PM on Aug 24th 2007 by TandemFixation
11. If dark_alex worked on it, thats good enough for me...and it does work.
Posted at 12:12AM on Aug 25th 2007 by mastereks
12. The "Pandora's Battery" as they call it, is just a regular psp battery. The battery of a psp has flash memory on it with boot information for the system. When converting the battery for this downgrade procedure, the psp program that you use actually dumps the batteries flash and puts a bin image with official sony firmware 1.50 and some developer code. When you place the converted battery into the psp it boots and runs the developer code and downgrades the psp. At this point, they say that the battery is useless. They have come out with an update that will convert the battery back and thats why they dump the flash first. After the psp is downgraded, if you use the converted "pandora's battery" as your power source, it will only run a partial of the 1.50 firmware because of the missing battery flash files. in order to have full 1.50 you must convert your battery back into a normal one. hope that all clarifies
Posted at 7:42PM on Aug 28th 2007 by Brandon
13. If u have already done this with out savin the info from ur battery no problem. Grab a friends battery and run pandora and save the their battery info. Pop out that battery, turn on the psp with charger plugged in and and put the Pandora battery back in the psp after the psp has booted and run the program again with the triggers held down.
Posted at 1:28PM on Aug 31st 2007 by boy10289
14. Lemme clarify the battery confusion. The only thing that pandora changes on the battery is the serial number of the battery. There isn't any 'code' in the eeprom of the battery, just information about the battery (i.e. manufacturer data, capacity, serial number, etc). The pandora battery changer just changes the serial number to all 1's in binary. The rom firmware in the PSP reads this serial number when you power it up. If it sees that serial number, it looks for the IPL code on the memory stick instead of the system flash. That's why pandora's 'battery' isn't just a battery. It's a battery and a memory stick. That's also the reason you can't use the battery like a normal battery, because it always tries to load the IPL from the memory stick if you boot with that battery in, which obviously won't work if you have a regular memory stick in. Plus it won't boot whatever firmware you may have installed on your PSP. It just boots the IPL on the pandora stick. Hope this clears some things up.
Posted at 1:13AM on Sep 1st 2007 by Raelik
15. hehe well i was modding psp about 3 months back i had the luck to be working at the local walmart at the time and have a friend in electronics dept. so i actually was a ble to leaf through and pick out a 2.0(i think?) and then i tried firmware downgrade and then S#!t power outage and instant $170 paper weight so i was crying my eyes out!!! then i turned it in and got a replacment and i bricked that one too! i was ripping my freaking hair out because ppl said u cant redo the firmware! i ask why? isnt there like a technicians debug port on the board!?
well anywho now ill be looking into buying bricks off ebay!
my gods i hate to love tech!
Posted at 3:10AM on Sep 1st 2007 by demonfox
16. The reason a PSP running 1.50 or custom firmware is required to create a pandora's battery is that you have to run some unsigned (i.e. homebrew) programs from the PSP itself to create the battery. Also, a memory stick pro duo is also required. Most people are suggesting to use a 256MB one, as it is the smallest pro duo you can get, plus it's guaranteed to work on one that small. You can't create a 'jigstick' (that's what they call the memory stick that works with the battery) out of a 4GB or larger one. A jigstick will work as a normal memory stick, but you have to have a jigstick to use the pandora's battery. Creating the jigstick is part of the process of creating the battery in the first place, so if you get a spare battery, a 256mb-2gb memory stick pro duo, and have access to a 1.5 or custom firmware PSP, just follow the instructions and you're set.
Posted at 10:23PM on Sep 1st 2007 by Raelik
17. Heey people...right jus a quick question..i have a psp on custom firmware and it bricked whilst trying to install pandoras battery aka "jigstick" i was jus wondering if i have a pandoras battery and mem stick, can i still use the battery that was in the bricked psp after ive unbricked it using pandoras battery ?
Please comment back
thanks :)
Posted at 4:04PM on Sep 4th 2007 by steven
18. Raelik: Thank you very much for the explanation (comment number 14). I wanted to know a little more about how it worked since the whole "jump starting" the psp analogy sounded somewhat dangerous. But this sounds good!
Posted at 4:55PM on Sep 8th 2007 by Serrator
19. excuse me but i just learned about pandora's battery. i just downloaded it and really the explanations arent that clear to me. if someone can guide me through this, i will be very happy. so in order to do this opperation, do i need a whole new battery and a psp that is at 1.5 right? or can i simply use the current one? im really confused here.
i knew i should have stopped updating my psp when my friend told me he put windows vista on his. for some reason i didnt care but now i really do. i want to be able to pimp my psp.
i have another question that has nothing to do with pandora's battery. i wanted to know why the 8gb memory stick would not work with version 2.80 and below. is there a way to make it work with those versions?
Posted at 12:43PM on Sep 10th 2007 by Frank Castle
20. hey guys,anyone know if the pandora battery will work on the newest psp available now in stores.(the thiner version of the psp) greatly appreciated if anyone could let me know.email=ses319@gmail.com
Posted at 11:20AM on Sep 18th 2007 by Jack
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1. WAIT!!! yes this works but you can save your battery!!! just hit triangle while in the pandora's battery program to back up your battery info, then hit x, follow instructions. then start up the psp w/o battery (meaning on power cord) and put the battery back in. run pandora's battery again but hold down l+r shoulders and it will restore your battery!
Posted at 2:12AM on Aug 24th 2007 by shayne