PSP Ring of Light

[Psyberjock]

http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/1333/img0315gr8.jpg

Here's a mod I just finished on my PSP. It was damn hard and took 30 hours over three days. I decided to do this mod because this PSP was bought used and the previous owner pulled up the silver ring on the UMD tray. It was included with the PSP but was scratched to hell and bent. I decided soon after I bought it that I would replace it, but it took a year before I decided what to do with it.

I used Llama's LED instructions and Everett's Push LED Mod instructions to assist me in my main board soldering points. The rest I dreamed up myself.

I mostly made things up as I went so I didn't take any work in progress pictures since I never knew which way I was going to go next.

That being said, I probably won't make a how-to. Considering the difficulty level of this mod, if you can't figure it out yourself, you'll probably just break your PSP or UMD tray. I used to mod my dreamcast and xbox, and this is by far the hardest thing I've done so far. If I get a lot of requests, I'll describe it and maybe make some graphics, but I doubt I'll take the PSP apart again for fear of having to solder some things again.

Bit more about the mod and pictures: UMDs work, the pictures show my PSP with a UMD in the tray and without. You'll notice on the last picture my electric tape peeled a little bit inside my UMD tray. A little light leaks through, but isn't an issue. One problem that I do have is that my UMDs stick a little bit when I want to take them out. I can take them out easily, they just don't kick out like they used to. I hope that will correct itself as things settle into their new shapes and positions. Also, I do have tatami floors. That's what the woven reeds are from. I do live in Japan afterall.

Well, here's the pictures: (note: I watermarked these myself and did so as a tribute to my favorite homebrew site. No one asked me to do so and I request that you leave them intact.)

More Pictures via comments

[dejkirkby]

That's cool. I want one!

[ExcruciationX]

Wow! Nice mod!

[Darksaviour69]

looks cool, thanks for posting

moved to news

[Psyberjock]

Thanks, I always wanted to make the front page! I hope it never falls off. (now there's an impossible dream)

[PSPKOR]

Nice mod, as an electronics engineer I can appreciate how hard that must have been without the wright documentation.
Good work:)
P.S- how did you get the plastic circle bit the correct size?

[one winged angel]

wow this is awsome

[joesnose]

that truly kick ass.

[mr_nick666]

Looks pretty sweet to me :D You cant go wrong with blue LEDs :p (did you use micro LEDs becuause of space restrictions?)

[Psyberjock]

Nice mod, as an electronics engineer I can appreciate how hard that must have been without the wright documentation.
Good work:)
P.S- how did you get the plastic circle bit the correct size?

:o Well, about 5 hours were due to my rusty soldering skills. I had to buy a soldering iron here in Japan since mine is in the US. So I guess its been almost 3-4 years since I've done real soldering.

The plastic circle was the easiest part. I took an old CD case and stuck the old metal circle on top of it. Then I traced around it with a marker so I could make sure it didn't move, then I just used an exacto knife and scored both sides of the CD case.

Make sure the scores are good and deep otherwise you'll crack it when you try to pop it out. Also, give yourself some space, you can carve it down more when its out of the surrounding plastic. When you do get it out without cracking it, leave the metal circle on there while you shave the sides down to the metal to make sure its the right shape. Do the same for the inside. In fact, make your preliminary scores for the inner portion and pop it out before you start shaving the outside just incase it breaks.

I got a perfect shape on my second try. The first time I tried I got the outside cut and popped out with no problem, it was the smaller inner circle that was an issue. Luckily I didn't perfect the outside before attempting the inside, so I didn't waste too much time on my failed attempt.

After I got it all trimmed and it fit perfectly, I used a sharpening whet-stone to give it a nice white finish. Just rub it around while running it under a faucet. The original clear case would have just let the light leave the circle without turning it all blue. Very fine grain sandpaper will do the same thing. Then I stuck it to the PSP with some double sided tape. That way I can remove it later if I decide to do something else.


Looks pretty sweet to me :D You cant go wrong with blue LEDs :p (did you use micro LEDs becuause of space restrictions?)

Oh yeah. We're talking maybe 1-2 millimeters of available space. I had to do everything as small as possible and then take measures to increase my available space. Plus, they were the only led's I had available to me. Like Everett, I used leds from an old cellphone. Nokia 3650. :D If I had used leds from radio shack or the Japanese equivilent, it would have been impossible. They have to be surface mount.

[gotmilk0112]

holy crap! thats weird!

[hanky]

That mod looks awesome dude! Nice work. I bet it would look really good with my Logitech case skin.

Pic of my PSP Case w/custom skin (http://cryptikdom.com/img/bioskin/bioskin.jpg)

Another Pic (http://cryptikdom.com/img/bioskin/bioskinfront.jpg)

[S34MU5]

Cool. ive seen this mod before but it takes away the PSP logo. and has dragons etc

[GobboFett]

Wow, that's very cool. Good job dude! :D Quick question, what powers the LED? I'm guessing the PSP being on powers it or does it have it's own power source?

[PSPages]

Hat's off to you mate, that looks incredible.

I would never atempt anything like that with mine. Too scared and just too crap at soldering :p

I often wondered though. Does adding LED's reduce the overall battery life of the PSP? I'm guessing it would but not sure how much of a difference.

[eLAy12]

great project. Job well done. I thought about putting lights on my psp too but i want an on off switch...hehe...sorry...

great job anyway!

[Psyberjock]

As far as battery life goes, I haven't done any kind of testing yet. I can only assume that this mod will suck 4 times as much as the power led since it uses comparable leds attached to the same circuit. Now if you think about how much of your overall batter life goes to the power led, you'll probably think its pretty insignificant. I do, so I don't mind applying the mod.

If I lose 5 minutes of playing time in order to run 4 more leds, I think that's worth it. I typically have my psp plugged in or only play for short amounts of time anyway (on the train for example).

As far as a switch goes, it would be pretty easy to interrupt the circuit with a switch, but I'd be more worried about the added switch to the outside of the case. I suppose if I attached it to the inside of the UMD drive that would be ok, where the TA-82s have their little idenifying mark for example. That could be doable and out of the way. But, it's too late for me, I'm happy and done and happy about being done. =) Thanks for the idea though.

Concerning the other UMD tray mods, I was actually unaware of them until your comment. I looked up one with an xbox jewel attached and it's pretty sweet to see the umd spinning, and with only two leds it would have been much easier to set up. But again, unfortunately I'm already done. At least this way I can keep the asthetic of the original Sony style case with just a slight modification to accent the ring. With the leds turned off (in other words, the PSP turned off) the white opaque ring looks very similar to the original silver ring. (and doesn't cross brand names)

Thanks for the info!

[ACID]

Now thats what i call kick a**. Cool.

[Cloudhunter]

Well, i'm scared about all mods, and have no soldering experience. But even I'M tempted to mod my psp because its so cool :p

Cloudhunter

[CandieC]

Man this is so great, i wish you would have did a wip, i would love to do this, my soldiering skills are top notch but my dremel skills are so/so , is this simalure to lets say cutting a window in the xbox / pc only on a tiny scale?

[vladiftodi]

cool indeed, but i wont take the risk :P

[Russoxley187]

Very nice...

I love it...
Kick a$$..

[vanle]

Nice mod, well done!

[weirdelf]

Looks cool but very hard

[Veskgar]

I really never pay attention to these types of MODs but THAT is really cool. What a nice super-clean mod. Great work!

[Apoklepz]

That is one sick mod...would be cool to have this one + the lights on the shoulder buttons...I bet the regular battery wouldn't stand much with those two mods done to your PSP clocked at 333mhz playing emus...But it is very , very sweet to look at.
Mad props, man...I bet it was a bitch to execute, too...but you pulled it off perfectly, so once again, Mad props.

[Stew2000]

Now that is how a psp is supposed to look. nice job :D

[darn02]

nice

[Briggzy11]

That is really good. I can now imagine this PSP with the LED Triggers and analogue mod, mixed with the PSPTouchme and I bet somebody will do a custom camera, more mods the merrier :)

[wraggster]

awesome mod, thanks for posting it here :)

i sent the news to Gizmodo.com and they posted it too ;)

[StuiWooi]

I bet the regular battery wouldn't stand much with those two mods done to your PSP clocked at 333mhz playing emus...But it is very , very sweet to look at

Even if you had both mods done I find it doubtful that whatever your doing with your psp that you would even lose 5 minutes of battery time, LEDs require almost no current, especially when there small ones

Anyway yes its very very nice, Im planning to buy a cheap-o second hand psp and try my hand at sticking shiny lights various places...only i will use the vastly superior color of green! :D Hooray for a degree (in progress) in electronic egineering

[That_PSP_Guy]

I too plan on doing this mod, if you could trace lines over a psp uncovered picture to show where you got your electrical supply from, would be awesome.

[chrono75]

Here's my problem with doing shit like this to my PSP... I only have one PSP!! These people doing these mods have quite a few PSPs if I'm not misteaken! And also, I thought wraggsters L and R buttom mod was so much cooler for some reason.

[psp411]

this is cool man.... another idea to mod out my psp.... im gonna try and make mine have a blinking design in it( in the works...):cool:

[TacticalBread]

Wow, this is really nice. I wish I had soldering and electrionic knowledge now, so I could do stuff like this.

[Psyberjock]

I too plan on doing this mod, if you could trace lines over a psp uncovered picture to show where you got your electrical supply from, would be awesome.

I'll put together some more details for you when I get home. I'm at work right now and I don't have access to my photos or photoshop. But I can tell you that I used the memory stick's led's resistor's left side and the left side of the green power led's resistor. The power led is the negative and the memory stick led is the positive. This part took a relatively short time. It was a little frustrating because they don't stay stuck very well, but a little hot glue will fix that. I'll discuss my materials and tools in just a second.


That is one sick mod...would be cool to have this one + the lights on the shoulder buttons...I bet the regular battery wouldn't stand much with those two mods done to your PSP clocked at 333mhz playing emus...But it is very , very sweet to look at.
Mad props, man...I bet it was a bitch to execute, too...but you pulled it off perfectly, so once again, Mad props.

That is really good. I can now imagine this PSP with the LED Triggers and analogue mod, mixed with the PSPTouchme and I bet somebody will do a custom camera, more mods the merrier :)

I really want to do the triggers and analog mod too, but after spending so much time working on this mod, I'm hesistant to do anything else. It was long and brain frying. I may go back and do more, I just need a break.

I have been thinking about the analog mod though. I think the, so far, typical spot is a little out of the way. I don't think I'd really be comfortable playing on an analog pad so far out of the reach of my normal playing position. If I come up with a remedy for this I'll let you know.


awesome mod, thanks for posting it here :)

i sent the news to Gizmodo.com and they posted it too ;)

Thanks!


Man this is so great, i wish you would have did a wip, i would love to do this, my soldiering skills are top notch but my dremel skills are so/so , is this simalure to lets say cutting a window in the xbox / pc only on a tiny scale?

Well, I actually didn't use a dremel tool on this. (My dremel tool is back in the States too) It's mostly soldering and scraping. Here's a quick run down of the tools and materials I used (if I forget something I'll update this post): soldering iron, solder, clear jewel CD case (for plastic circle), super small twisted insulated wire, hobby knife, awl (rapid wire channel scraping), double sided tape (sticking the circle to the psp), surface mount leds from an old cellphone, electric tape, hot glue gun and hot glue, small screwdrivers (flat and phillips for opening the psp), sandpaper (for dulling finger slicing edges of the inner metal umd tray (also dangerous to wires)), a whetstone (for frosting the newly formed circle), the original metal circle (as a pattern), and tweezers (for general grabbing and holding of very small things).

I think that's everything and most of their purposes. If there is one thing that I could say about modding the PSP as compared to the xbox and dreamcast is, "damn that's small." I probably would have benefitted from buying a maginifying glass attached to some clips, but I just couldn't be bothered. The only place that sells those is a 40 minute train ride away. Often I couldn't really see the precise solder I was trying to attach wire to, but I knew it was there and I tried to apply a bit more solder until I could see what I was working with. If you break anything while working on it, you have to use something of an equivilent level of technology (usually) to repair it. Radio Shack and such places just don't really carry the most modern surface mount peices that you'll find in a PSP. You need something that is designed to be small and compact, like a cellphone, that you can harvest parts from.

In retrospect I think I learned that even though the PSP is MUCH smaller electronically, and that brings many difficulties, it is still the same. It has circuit boards, transistors, resistors, etc, and they're all pretty durable. If you have ever modded something before, don't be afraid of modding your PSP. If you're just starting out on modding you have a couple of choices: practice on some old systems first, or get ready for a really big learning curve. If you know someone who is good at soldering or even modding ask them to look over your shoulder or teach you a few basics.

---

I think that should answer a lot of questions and maybe raise a few more. Thanks for all the comments and compliments. They're encouraging and may get me to do a couple more mods.

Thanks!

[kiore]

Nice work :) You have now given me a idea for a mod, time to bring out the soldering iron and leds.

[shadowhawk22]

I like it! Good Job!

[Psyberjock]

I just added a video on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/v/D3Usz0rMN-M

[mr_nick666]

Nice video mate! :p Its like performing arts for the PSP! :rolleyes: Good to see it all in action (liking your PSPs wallpaper too! ;) )

[StuiWooi]

w00t!! i see monster hunter! awesome game, already commented on the mod, but again, its nice, even if its blue

[BlackDeath]

Very nice mod! Any chance there you make a tutorial on this?

[zaidkhan]

i have a great idea, but would like someone else to do this because my modding skills are zero, and i unfortunately have no time to even start learning!!!

you know the grille on the top of the psp, right above the screen? what if you sorta 'sanded away' a bit of the black plastic from behind it, and stuffed in a few LEDs there? that could mean having a lighted grille! :D:D:D:D:D:D

and is it possible to connect the LEDs to the screen so that the LEDs turn off when you turn off the screen? that would work better with some people, i think.

[sixtnineing69]

wat was the sand paper for i don't get that part

[mad-brian]

Yeah me too but it's a cool idea really, also wiring them up to the screen WOULD be a good idea but could cause problems, how about wiring it to a micro switch maybe which gives you a choice to have it on or off?

[123456]

Although u said it was extremely difficult to do, I still want to risk requesting how to make it. THIS MOD KICKS ASS!!!!!!!!!