Desert Bunker

The PS3 is now capable of running backed up games from either the internal HDD or an external drive with the use of a USB device that puts the PS3 into developer/debug mode. It doesn’t appear to be an exploit.

News of the device first hit PSX-Scene.com, at first with many users claiming it to be fake. But after several test units began being sent to well-respected scene members, it was confirmed that this magic little device is the real deal.

Here’s a video of the USB dongle in action, loading a game supposedly already backed up on the drive:

Not only will you be able to back up your games to a hard drive, but it is now possible to run unsigned homebrew code on your console, so one can only imagine what sorts of exciting things will be developed.

Oh, and for those of you with PS3s and an extra $120, you can purchase this device right now from these guys: PSJailbreak.com

Clones are apparently already being made, after a few have identified the guts of the goods. The dongle was identified to have the Atmel ATMEGA32U4 micro-controller. Expect a few good copycats and possible malicious attempts to make a quick buck from the uninitiated buyer.

As for Sony, they haven’t commented on the situation. But I’m pretty sure they must be throwing a fit over this, especially since the PS3 is just beginning to make money and outsell the competition. Many fear that Sony may further cripple the PS3 and decide to do something drastic, such as disable USB functionality altogether. Although it’s unlikely that Sony would do such an injustice to users, Sony’s been known to take desperate measures for even the slightest signs of a weakness in their flagship video game console.

Update: Based on the information here, the PSJailbreak ATMEGA chip is NOT updatable. Replacing the hardware is the only way to update the device, if at all. They also go in to detail about how the PSJailbreak works:

We can confirm that PSJailbreak is in fact no simple clone of Sony´s “Jig” modul, instead it´s an honest, self developed exploit. The Chip inside is no PIC18F444 but an ATMega with USB-software. That means that the chip is capable of internal USB emulation. PSJailbreak mainly emulates a 6-port USB-hub to that several USB-devices get connected and disconnected in a speciffic sequence. One of these devices has the ID of Sony´s “Jig” modul, so that means that the “Jig” played a certain role during the development of PSJailbreak.

But first things first: When switching the PS3 on, a device is connected within the USB-emulation, which has a too large configuration descriptor. This discriptor overwrites the stack with contained PowerPC-code that is executed. Now various other devices get connected within the emulation. One device has a 0xAD large descriptor that is part of the exploit and contains static data. Short time later (we´re talking about milliseconds here) the “Jig” gets connected and encrypted data is sent to the “Jig”.
An eternity later (in milliseconds that is) the “Jig” answers with 64Bytes of static data, all USB-devices get disconnected, a new device is connected and the PS3 restarts in a new look.

Brought to you by: DesertBunker

Using the Calculator included with Android is a pain in the ass when you’re likely to only use subtraction for a card game. The Yu-Gi-Oh trading card game is one such game that requires one to keep track of their life points to determine the victor in a ‘duel.’ Still, many players with Android phones seem content with using their Calculator along with the decimal trick to track both players’ LP. I find this to be annoying and unreliable; one wrong click and next thing you know you’re both unsure of each others’ life points. With this in mind, and the dissatisfying lack of options for such an open platform as Android, I built my own life points calculator.

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There’s many different solutions out there that give you the ability to access and share your collection of music over the net. Many of them of work, sort of. It really depends on how you want to present your music to the user and how much functionality you’re willing to give access to. In this case, I’ve found a fairly self-contained music streaming server that gives you access to your music through web based flash player, with a login system to boot.

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It was only a matter of time.  Verizon’s flagship Android handset was finally rooted the other day. For those with Droids, I highly suggest you get the rooted ROM before an OTA patch is pushed.

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Been busy for a while, but I’m definitely not going to let the site rot. So here’s an update for those who have been waiting.

Ever try to visit one of your favorite websites for your daily dosage of internet vegetation, only to be disappointed by a 404 Error? I found a fairly useful tool I’ve been using for quite some time now that will allow you to see if, in fact, a website is up and running.

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The a flame has been rekindled for quite possibly one of the greatest RPG series ever created for the PC. The announcement for Diablo 3 was made today in Paris during the Blizzard Entertainment Worldwide Invitational and has spawned a great deal of excitement for fans of the best selling game.

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I recently came across a relatively new MMORPG called Shaiya from Aeria Games. The first thing that came to my mind was, “I’ve got to build a bot for this game.” Instead of taking the long and grueling route of reverse engineering incoming/outgoing packets and having to deal with updated versions of the game (blah blah BLAH,) I’m taking the easier way out and building a bot using the AutoIt3 scripting language. With AutoIt, one could simulate keystrokes, mouse clicks, mouse movements, and various other naturally occurring Windows events. While tinkering with the game for a few days, I found a way to get a hold of the game’s textures. These can be used for any number of reasons but I’m going to use these for color tracking.

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Update:  This tutorial is tailored toward version 0.8.6i of VLC Media Player. The interface in the later builds of VLC are quite different.

However, it is recommended that you use 0.8.6i if you wish to stream without any issues. It seems the developers have neglected any progress on the transcoding aspect of VLC and as a result introduced many bugs that reduce quality as well as consume more CPU during runtime.

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Go here to read the summarized guide.

A few people have been coming to me and asking how they can stream videos to their friends or across their network. It seems that not many average users knew that this could be done with VLC media player. Many encoders are either too complex, require you to register with their website in order to use their software, or are just plain slow and clunky. There aren’t many programs that that I’ve come across that accomplish video streaming as well as VLC.

Luckily, the streaming portion of VLC isn’t too terribly difficult for anyone to operate, and today, I’m going to show you how you can do this yourself.

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For those who just can’t wait for the upcoming critically hyped game Spore, the creature creator demo has been released for the public to download. Anyone can create their own unique creature with a wide range of different body parts, colors, behaviors, and your creation will be fully compatible with Spore when the full game is launched. Control your species as it evolves through the game; from a microbial life, to full-fledged technologically advanced civilizations. Unfortunately, this version does not include all of the features that will be present in the final creature creator. I suggest downloading it anyway so you can get a feel for how the system works.

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Here’s a very simple and nearly useless script I made awhile back. Hopefully, some of you may get some joy out of it. The purpose of the Ventrilo Channel Mover is to annoy your fellow Ventrilo users.

To use, make sure Ventrilo is open, and you are currently connected to a server. Open Ventrilo_Channel_Mover_1.0b.exe and click ‘Spam Channel Movements’ to start erratically moving about the various channels on the server. It works by focusing the Ventrilo window, simulating the Up and Down arrow keys, then pressing Enter. While this is happening, you will not be able to send clicks or keypresses to other applications without disrupting the Channel Mover.

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