PS3 A shoutout thank you to all the developers, QA tester and hardware people who make all this possible

J Boy

Forum Noob
This is a shoutout because I feel console scenes need a little more love/light in them. I wanted to do a shoutout thank you to all the developers who have made this scene possible and all those QA testing. These people give their time, and energy (a lot of it) for free to reverse-engineer complex intricate hardware and software. I cannot describe how intricate this is, unless you were in the know. Think hours and hours of effort and work.

People like @bguerville and all the other developers who enable these consoles to be unlocked deserve thanks and appreciation, and for that, thank you! Thanks to the work of you all, all our favourite multiplayer games and all the DLCs I bought now exist as offline pkg install discs I can just pop into a console and install with the package manager in a single click. Something goes wrong I can dump the syscon and debug and whip out the soldering station. If the NOR goes bad, I can just restore the dumps (even from my legit consoles that you can take with bgtoolset) and restore the NOR including per-console keys. Done before there is a problem and I would call on any PS3 owner to take this little 16MB backup even from your legit systems as bgtoolset runs in RAM only until you patch.

I am not big into piracy for games unless you are on a low-income and cannot afford expensive games. Never ever would use a cheat online. I buy all my content legit (if Able) but the jailbreak scene has enabled me to preserve that content in a DRM-Free way for my social group who regularly LANs on PS3 to keep using it for years to come on a LAN, and to install the content on all the consoles in my gaming room. Even basic things like dumping the NOR chip to keep backups of metldr keys is important to the preservation of this hardware for use for as long as possible. This is actually why I like a good jailbreak.

My social group loves the PS3 as a LAN box. I game only socially and we hangout a lot for LAN parties on games like MW2 and Black Ops 2. Those DLCs were cheap entertainment that have provided years of fun already for the cost of less than a night out. It has got me through years of ill and sick health (physical, my mental health is very good). But i have seen with the XZ crisis that nearly caused many web servers to be compromised how poor mental health of people who put in their time for free can cause harm.

So next time anyone wants 'Jailbreak on firmware XYZ now plz, chop chop' step back and consider what that entails, to people doing it unpaid, for free as a labour of love or passion. Send the developers your love and support. And to any developers working on this, if you feel the need to take a break, you are beholden to no one and your mental / physical / spiritual health comes first. Know your work is appreciated, and thank you so much for enabling the games I enjoy to be enjoyed for years to come by a social group who loves the platform.
 
I love that the PS3 still gets the flowers after all these years. From the quirks of the Cell processor to the legendary game library, it's truly one of a kind. While it's sad that we may never get another console quite like it, I'm glad it left such a lasting legacy
 
Yeah its a wonderful system, and even to this day stands out as an all in one media player. Blu-Rays, audio, etc. Its excellent and has the best interface. It can even play H264 MP4 files on disc, something the PS4/5 won't do!
 
Yeah its a wonderful system, and even to this day stands out as an all in one media player. Blu-Rays, audio, etc. Its excellent and has the best interface. It can even play H264 MP4 files on disc, something the PS4/5 won't do!
Interesting, I didn't know that! I've only ever played H.264 MP4s on the PS4 via USB, which means dealing with that annoying FAT32 file size limit. Plus the PS4 Media Player has a mind of its own and only works sporadically. Have you noticed any comparable difference between the BD player on the PS3 versus the PS4? I actually think the PS3's UI is so much nicer, but for some reason I get FOMO if I don't use the PS4 to play my discs
 
Interesting, I didn't know that! I've only ever played H.264 MP4s on the PS4 via USB, which means dealing with that annoying FAT32 file size limit. Plus the PS4 Media Player has a mind of its own and only works sporadically. Have you noticed any comparable difference between the BD player on the PS3 versus the PS4? I actually think the PS3's UI is so much nicer, but for some reason I get FOMO if I don't use the PS4 to play my discs
I have not noticed much difference to be honest over 1080p on flat screens (though our main living room TV is a CRT, we have a flatscreen in the gaming corner and another portable we pull out during LAN parties; my group can have a decent sized lobby in person, if our extended group gets together we can have nearly a full lobby). I think play on whatever device you want and they both do the job well. The FAT32 file size limit is something that has stonewalled me for years; the PS4 can support ExFAT though, which removes the limit, at the cost of no backup copy of the FAT, so an unclean unplug can be catastrophic with the loss of all directory structure (so backups are needed as always). Happened to me twice in my life, both brain farts forgetting to unplug as I should. FAT32 has a redundant copy of the FAT, NTFS/EXT4 journals but the PS4 does not support either. If you want to remove that limit on a PS4 just format it as ExFAT.

The FAT32 size limit is why I have copies of the PKGs i bought on a set of five dual-layer 50GB discs (DLCs mostly and digital games), signed in, downloaded, backed up the RAP licenses before I did my jailbreak). They work and have used them. I pop them in, install the PKGs from the list and homebrew and just copy the exdata folder from the disc using a file manager or insert the archival SLC USB stick with those raps on them in said folder, click create RIF files in EvilNat, done. No PC or slow FTP needed or internet connection to re-obtain them or splitting files around for multiman to read. You an even reinstall firmware from a disc, but I just keep a copy of the latest EvilNat on the SLC stick and a copy on disc. They install far faster than using slow FTP to transfer then install.
 
Gee that's gnarly! what size is your CRT? I always wanted one to play retro games but the size and weight has always been an issue so I've just resorted to shaders and whatnot. I currently have a 50 inch Plasma as my main display, motion resolution while not on the level of CRT is still much superior to sample and hold, plus it's 3D capable and works seamlessly with the PS3/PS4.

And regarding PKG transfers - I've found running FTP over a direct ethernet connection to my Mac is the most stress free method. It's just a simple drag and drop and speed tops out at around 20 MB/s. Luckily I don't have to do it too often since like you most of my games are on physical media
 
Interesting, I didn't know that! I've only ever played H.264 MP4s on the PS4 via USB, which means dealing with that annoying FAT32 file size limit. Plus the PS4 Media Player has a mind of its own and only works sporadically. Have you noticed any comparable difference between the BD player on the PS3 versus the PS4? I actually think the PS3's UI is so much nicer, but for some reason I get FOMO if I don't use the PS4 to play my discs
Actually, whether it's playing media files or installation PKGs, you can use the NTFS format. You just need to use Irisman to mount the file to the BD drive, which will bypass the limitations of the FAT32.

The media playback UI of PS3 is the same as that of PS2, likely developed by SCE Japanese team. It feels very professional, and the shortcut function buttons on the controller make it very convenient and comfortable. In comparison, the media player in PS4 can only be described as terrible. If you want to use a media player on it, I recommend installing PPlay, which is much better than the official player.
 
Gee that's gnarly! what size is your CRT? I always wanted one to play retro games but the size and weight has always been an issue so I've just resorted to shaders and whatnot. I currently have a 50 inch Plasma as my main display, motion resolution while not on the level of CRT is still much superior to sample and hold, plus it's 3D capable and works seamlessly with the PS3/PS4.

And regarding PKG transfers - I've found running FTP over a direct ethernet connection to my Mac is the most stress free method. It's just a simple drag and drop and speed tops out at around 20 MB/s. Luckily I don't have to do it too often since like you most of my games are on physical media
@Lana its a 21' CRT :) Some of the plasma displays were epic to look at.

@psdavx I was having issues getting NTFS to work despite MultiMAN having the option to use them, it would just never be detected. I am on Linux though using ntfs-3g and I know it handles the Journal side of NTFS differently so maybe that has been my issue. I just use my disc method for my content and that was far simpler to execute and needs no setup in future. I never tried with Irisman, I got ExFAT to be recognised there but i preferred MultiMANs interface by far.
 
I was having issues getting NTFS to work despite MultiMAN having the option to use them, it would just never be detected. I am on Linux though using ntfs-3g and I know it handles the Journal side of NTFS differently so maybe that has been my issue. I just use my disc method for my content and that was far simpler to execute and needs no setup in future. I never tried with Irisman, I got ExFAT to be recognised there but i preferred MultiMANs interface by far.
I remember that if you want the Multiman to recognize NTFS hard drives, you need to write a USB.CFG file and then copy it to the Multiman USRDIR folder. Sorry, I forgot how to write the file, but I think you should be able to find it by searching online.
 
@psdavx thanks for pointing that out, I had no idea you could do that. It seems like extra steps compared to popping in my now prepped discs, but it is a good plan B faster option for if I end up with a dead disk drive on any of my consoles in absence of a spare, so its a good plan B for me. Thanks again!
 
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