New to PSP PSX emulation - 3.02 issues

Hi, I'm no stranger to PS P emulation - I got my system to play SNES / Genesis games a few years with little difficulty - but I just HAD to upgrade to play the new release of Valkyrie Profile. Now - with my Playstaion 1 console destroyed - I need a new medium to play all my old ps1 games. I was going to just use epsxe on my desktop - but then I got the idea that maybe I could play these games on my PSP. Imagine my surprise that it looked like a massive revolution happened a year back I had no idea happened!

Now here's the problem ... I am overwhelmed. I don't even know where to start when it comes to getting my PSP to run PSX games. A google search gives me a literal explosion of information and I have no means at all to sift through all of it.

So where do I begin? To start - my PSP's version is 3.02 ( I am certain this is an official one I did through the network update option ).

So - what is a noob to do? I want to relive my old Resident Evil, Final Fantasy and Chrono Cross days and blow some dust off these discs :)

Ok, there are two downgraders.
- A 3.03 downgrader that requires an unpatched GTA: Liberty City Stories UMD
- A 3.11/3.50 Downgrader that requires Lumines 1.

After that, upgrade to Custom Firmware (A modernized firmware with homebrew capabilities). I believe the newest out there as of now is 3.90 M33-2.

I dont really know how to do anything past that because I dont own a PSP myself :p

EDIT: Custom Firmware is NEEDED to play PS1 games as it makes use of the Sony's Commercial emulator used in Firmware 3.00 and above.

So - I am 3.02 but I will downgrade to 3.03 with the one downgrader? Or do I first need to get my PSP to 3.03 then use the first downgrader?

The version my PSP is now - I couldn't just simply grab the newest costum firmware ( or do I need to downgrade as low as I can go and then work my way up??)

No you can't, you need to downgrade to 1.5 before being able to install the latest custom firmware.

Basically, firstly you have to UPGRADE, to a firmware version which has a downgrader for it. Either 3.03, 3.11 or 3.50. To upgrade to one of those, you need to put the official update folder on your memory stick. You can download them here. As Eviltaco has already pointed out, to downgrade from 3.03 you must have the unpatched Liberty City's UMD inserted, and for the 3.11/3.50 it's the Lumines UMD. So go to your local game store, before you decide which. I'd recommend using the 3.50 downgrader via Lumines if available, as that's how I done it. You can get the downgraders from here. These downloads should come with a readme .txt, with step by step instructions on what to do.

Now provided you followed that right, you should now be at 1.5. There you can download the latest custom firmware, which would be Dark_Alex's M33 firmwares. Now you'll need to upgrade it in a certain order, which is 1.5 > 3.52 > 3.52-4 > 3.90 > 3.90-2. In that order. You can get Dark_Alex's firmwares, and patches at his website. Once you've done all that, post back.