Playing Real PS1 Discs on PlayStation Classic Mini

[Ponlork]

 

[hippy dave]

Wildly unnecessary and pretty cool ngl

 

[Jayro]

I thought this thread would be a hot mess of "can I do this?" but damn, I'm surprised this works.

I really hope they figure out how to add USB CD-ROM support for the MiSTer core eventually.

 

[Ponlork]

now i just needa figure out how to cram the optical disc drive inside. it's more for novelty. i'll like to develop a psx homebrew someday that'll be pressed on mini discs which will work on a real psx as well as this mini psc. there are some advantages to using physical discs, for games like Vib ribbon and MTV Music generator, you can sample discs. With this method you can eject and insert a new disc. Previously to do that with emulation you'll have to eject it with the virtual disc drive and then mount a new ISO

i never tried mister but i imagine they have a similar problem. there are games like Ridge Racer that lets you insert your own Audio CD to play while racing. I tried that with emulation and it doesn't refresh the TOC

 

[Jayro]

now i just needa figure out how to cram the optical disc drive inside. it's more for novelty. i'll like to develop a psx homebrew someday that'll be pressed on mini discs which will work on a real psx as well as this mini psc. there are some advantages to using physical discs, for games like Vib ribbon and MTV Music generator, you can sample discs. With this method you can eject and insert a new disc. Previously to do that with emulation you'll have to eject it with the virtual disc drive and then mount a new ISO

i never tried mister but i imagine they have a similar problem. there are games like Ridge Racer that lets you insert your own Audio CD to play while racing. I tried that with emulation and it doesn't refresh the TOC

It's a bit of a process, but I borrowed and modified some 3d-printed parts from people's "Raspberry Pi inside a PS1 shell" projects and I even made a few 3D-printed parts myself, but I stuffed an entire MiSTer FPGA system inside a PS1 shell. I call it my MiSTerStation™. I made sure the controllers and memory cards also worked 100%, so from the front it looks totally stock.

I'm assuming people would be able to stick the PS1 Classic's board inside in a similar fashion, also and have a working CD-ROM.

 

[Chaoticus]

Is is compatible with all portable CD/DVD drives or only a select few like seen in the video??

 

[Ponlork]

Is is compatible with all portable CD/DVD drives or only a select few like seen in the video??

pretty much every optical drive i tried worked, however some work better than others. i notice with USB 3.0 drives, it may take longer to read. sometimes i even have to tilt the drive for it to recognize a disc.

what's unique about this Panasonic drive is it's a USB 2.0 that doesn't require external power. and it's a flip top cover so that might make it easier to modify with the psc's case as it wont have a tray with those pins ejecting it.
https://fareastgizmos.com/computing/panasonic_usbpowered_portable_dvd_multi_drive_lfp968c.php

so far this drive is the most consistent one ive tried so far. i actually contacted someone who might be able to put it in the psc case for me. there's no guarantee but it's worth a shot.

 

[_Ruri_]

Wildly unnecessary and pretty cool ngl

These unnecessary and complicated but cool things are the best, ngl

 

[Ponlork]

These unnecessary and complicated but cool things are the best, ngl

to me it's kinda like people who put a coin door into their arcade1up. some may think its pointless but to others it may add a bit to the illusion. I've seen people assemble model kits of the original playstation that does nothing but work as a figure to showcase

like this here:


I just so happen to be making a miniature playstation that's fully functional lol it's also motivating me to create a UI that will closely resemble the original PlayStation boot up, and i'll mod it internally so it'll boot up with the custom ui. sometimes people have a idea and it'll yield to other things that will benefit them, like hacking or programming.

hell some people play 100hr jrpgs that others would find pointless. to me this is like a final boss, instead of beating akuma or mike tyson, my final boss is completing a project and solving a problem that's difficult. and the prize is having a cute device that i'll feel proud of, and maybe pickup some skills related to development and hacking

even getting the psc to read cds and then compiling pcsx rearmed to be able to work with Retroarch's disc project was a 5 year long journey that required soldering and stuff. sometimes its the challenge that's thrilling. challenging things bring out the creativity in people

 

[_Ruri_]

to me it's kinda like people who put a coin door into their arcade1up. some may think its pointless but to others it may add a bit to the illusion. I've seen people assemble model kits of the original playstation that does nothing but work as a figure to showcase

like this here:


I just so happen to be making a miniature playstation that's fully functional lol it's also motivating me to create a UI that will closely resemble the original PlayStation boot up, and i'll mod it internally so it'll boot up with the custom ui. sometimes people have a idea and it'll yield to other things that will benefit them, like hacking or programming.

hell some people play 100hr jrpgs that others would find pointless. to me this is like a final boss, instead of beating akuma or mike tyson, my final boss is completing a project and solving a problem that's difficult. and the prize is having a cute device that i'll feel proud of, and maybe pickup some skills related to development and hacking

The mini plastic PS1 (Plasticstation? lol) is so awesome haha. Yours is a pretty cool project. What if you put something like a Raspberry PI inside the model PS1? Would it be doable?

I understand lol, not much knowledgeable about programming (although I'll be taking CS in college) but I understand the solving problems part lol. Solving problems has basically become second nature for me since I got my desktop PC lol.

 

[Ponlork]

The mini plastic PS1 (Plasticstation? lol) is so awesome haha. Yours is a pretty cool project. What if you put something like a Raspberry PI inside the model PS1? Would it be doable?

I understand lol, not much knowledgeable about programming (although I'll be taking CS in college) but I understand the solving problems part lol. Solving problems has basically become second nature for me since I got my desktop PC lol.

i prefer to keep the stock psc board, it just feels official. i had a raspberry pi 3b+ for my arcade1up, honestly i'm not really a fan of it. it had retropie and i didnt like all the options. i want to keep it as simple as possible to where you can let kids use it and they can figure it out. when i try some of these other builds, its too overwhelming and kids would be like, "how do i get out?" how do i change games? i think i messed something up.

one of the appealing things about consoles and arcades back in the day is you can just hop on it and figure it out, no tutorials or nothing. just select a game and play and that's the energy im trying to replicate with this device.

when i first started on this project i barely knew what linux was
https://www.reddit.com/r/classicmods/comments/d8j1ry/playstation_classic_minidvd_project_idea/

people were telling me the idea was stupid lol but hey at least i'll put a decent effort. some people would be quick to say something is impossible before they even try. and in my mind those people tend to be quitters.

if someone is truly passionate about an idea, even if it's improbable they wouldn't use the word impossible. to say something is impossible is loser talk. at least that's how i see it. they may know it's unlikely but they'll keep the dream alive

it's like people who say getting PS5 games to run on it is impossible. but a person who thinks outside the box may say, u ever heard of remote sharing apps like chiaki-ng? thats possible, even if its not as desirable they didnt say improbable they said impossible which is a term i hate hearing

yes im a realist too but i still dont like having people on my team who use those words cuz they have a defeatist mentality where they immediately dismiss without even trying

 

[_Ruri_]

i prefer to keep the stock psc board, it just feels official. i had a raspberry pi 3b+ for my arcade1up, honestly i'm not really a fan of it. it had retropie and i didnt like all the options. i want to keep it as simple as possible to where you can let kids use it and they can figure it out. when i try some of these other builds, its too overwhelming and kids would be like, "how do i get out?" how do i change games? i think i messed something up.

one of the appealing things about consoles and arcades back in the day is you can just hop on it and figure it out, no tutorials or nothing. just select a game and play and that's the energy im trying to replicate with this device.

when i first started on this project i barely knew what linux was
https://www.reddit.com/r/classicmods/comments/d8j1ry/playstation_classic_minidvd_project_idea/

people were telling me the idea was stupid lol but hey at least i'll put a decent effort. some people would be quick to say something is impossible before they even try. and in my mind those people tend to be quitters.

if someone is truly passionate about an idea, even if it's improbable they wouldn't use the word impossible. to say something is impossible is loser talk. at least that's how i see it. they may know it's unlikely but they'll keep the dream alive

it's like people who say getting PS5 games to run on it is impossible. but a person who thinks outside the box may say, u ever heard of remote sharing apps like chiaki-ng? thats possible, even if its not as desirable they didnt say improbable they said impossible which is a term i hate hearing

yes im a realist too but i still dont like having people on my team who use those words cuz they have a defeatist mentality where they immediately dismiss without even trying

Yeah, makes sense. I really like too how old consoles were way more plug and play than modern consoles. No menus (although I think modern menus still look cool), just disk/cartridge and boom, start the game.

Pretty cool. You probably heard this a lot of times but I could never do something like this haha. I just can't keep focus on just one thing for an extended period of time, even if I'm passionate about it, and I think it's pretty cool when people can actually do things like this.

Honestly I agree, if you really want to do things like this then you need to be mentally committed first and foremost. And even if it turns out something actually can't be done then at least you know you tried, and learned some knowledge along the way.

 

[bakus522]

IT JUST WORKS???
Alright, so how much is the monthly live service subscription? lol

 

[Ponlork]

IT JUST WORKS???
Alright, so how much is the monthly live service subscription? lol

it's a bit of a process to get it to work but basically, first you gotta load up these cdrom drivers. i modified the Autobleem start script to load it up on boot.
https://honeylab.hatenablog.jp/entry/2019/01/16/002111

in the future i'll like to add the drivers in internally. i'll like to have this work without the use of a USB flash drive.

now the thing with the PSC's front ports are they have a current limit of 5v @ 100mA which is not enough to power the cd/dvd drive. there is a way to disable the limit by performing this mod:
https://modmyclassic.com/wiki/index.php?title=PlayStation_Classic#USB_Current_Limiting

there's also a way to bypass the limit by using a OTG cable, however for some reason Retroarch's disc project doesn't recognize game discs when I plug the cd/dvd drive into the OTG cable. it would just show Failed to load or something. As a last ditch effort i thought maybe if i perform the current limit removal mod and plug it from the front it'll work. Thinking it's highly unlikely but i figure what the hell

so i did that and to my surprise it actually worked. i just took a wild guess and it solved the problem


the next problem is the retroarch disc project only works with the Beetle PSX core, which is too demanding for the PSC. i mean it works but you can't even get half speed on it.

that was a problem that was bugging me for years, i even went so far as to compile Duckstation cuz i notice that they have a option for loading real discs. turns out that feature was for windows only. The playstation classic uses linux armv7. so that idea ended up being pointless, but not really cuz in doing so i compiled a duckstation and swanstation core for the psc and that was useful

then i ended up shelving the project for years until i was told that the PCSX ReArmed core can work with the disc project if compiled with a certain VFS option enabled.

to make a long story short i contacted notaz who's the maintainer of the pcsx rearmed project and he added disc support to it and now it works
https://github.com/notaz/pcsx_rearmed/issues/335

and now ive reached the final frontier which is trying to figure out how to cram the optical drive into that little mini psc case