PSone - What kind of mod is this?

[ady05113]

Hello all. Can you guys identify what kind of mod is this? It was found inside a broken PSone (SCPH-103) that i bought from a garage sales. I'm so curious about it. By the way the laser is broken. It doesn't spin nor have any laser at all. I attached some photos below hope you guys can help me.

Thanks in advance and stay safe!

[Administrator]

Hmm. My guess without looking up those chip numbers would be a VCD player. Looks like there is an infrared diode on the front of the system too for a remote control. Pull the system apart more and see where those wires are soldered to

[rama3]

Very curious. I agree with shadow on the hardware VCD player.
That is the most likely modification that would warrant such an amount of logic in the early 2000s.

[ady05113]

Very curious. I agree with shadow on the hardware VCD player.
That is the most likely modification that would warrant such an amount of logic in the early 2000s.

That makes sense for me too. By the way i did swap the faulty laser with a working laser just to test this unit with games. It can read disc original and copies (modchip installed). But i don't have any VCD to test at the moment.
Can i just google any VCD Movie of any types and burn it into CD-R to test if it really a VCD mod? (Sorry for dumb question)

Hmm. My guess without looking up those chip numbers would be a VCD player. Looks like there is an infrared diode on the front of the system too for a remote control. Pull the system apart more and see where those wires are soldered to

Thanks for your response @Shadow. Here i attach another photo below the PSone motherboard where the wiring of the mods goes to.

[Administrator]

Okay, now I'm confused. Why is it soldered to the Memory Card slot? Maybe it also simulates a Memory Card.
Also, where are the other wires going?? You didn't take a photo of the complete solder work.

[TriMesh]

Yeah, it's a Video CD player board - the CL680 is one of the original single-chip VCD player devices. I suspect that board marked "PS2DVD" is a modchip and the marking is just camoflage.

The wires connected to the memory card socket are so the board can read the controller - the pins for the controller and the memory card are just wired in parallel and by the look of it the memory card pins were closer.

[ady05113]

Also, where are the other wires going?? You didn't take a photo of the complete solder work.

Really sorry. I'm afraid if i touch it, i might mess up something. So i decided to leave it there like it was.

Yeah, it's a Video CD player board - the CL680 is one of the original single-chip VCD player devices. I suspect that board marked "PS2DVD" is a modchip and the marking is just camoflage.

The wires connected to the memory card socket are so the board can read the controller - the pins for the controller and the memory card are just wired in parallel and by the look of it the memory card pins were closer.

Thanks for the info @TriMesh. I believe the mods comes with its own remote control. So that means the remote control replacement is not possible right?

[Administrator]

@TriMesh, I don't think that PS2DVD chip is a modchip. It's connected to the Memory Card (controller) bus so it's probably used to convert the monitor controller input data and convert it to something more simplistic that the VCD board can then understand.

EDIT: Ah, actually, you know what it's doing? It's taking the IR remote signals and converting them to controller button signals that the PSone can understand

[TriMesh]

Yeah, that makes sense - in that case presumably there is an IR receiver somewhere and that little board is just reading the IR stream and simulating pushing buttons on the controller.