UniROM 8.0.K - GDB Debugging, install/backup to/from memory card, homebrew from memcard, etc

[dragondude]

i have a game hunter cd version UK I/O cart and it's coming up as an unknown EEPROM yes it has mod play on it already but it's very choosy about what backups it will allow to load so i kind of wanted to put unirom on it seems like i won't be able to for now
and heres a picture of the device that im talking about
mine has a green case but the internals are exactly the same

[Administrator]

There's a bug with UniROM where the old PU-8 BIOS's refuses to boot it. I sent you a PM about it and the solution

[dragondude]

you sent me a PM or are you saying someone else? if you were talking about me i just checked messages and i aint got any

[Administrator]

you sent me a PM or are you saying someone else? if you were talking about me i just checked messages and i aint got any

Sorry, I meant 'Sicklebrick'.

[MottZilla]

A tip for anyone having problems with the Nocash CD Unlock and games doing odd things. After I noticed a number of games having problems being booted with UniROM I tried using UniROM to send the Unlock code and then I loaded GameShark Lite, the CD based version created for systems without the parallel port. Sadly it adds quite a bit of time to the loading process but it fixes the issues I was having with games not working. And it was not just newer games either because if I recall The Raiden Project had issues and it certainly wouldn't have any checks against anything.

I haven't tried UniROM .44 yet. I'm pretty sure I was using .24 at the time. So maybe the loading routine could be improved. I was hoping eventually to see something that could load and patch the Shell program the BIOS loads so that the security could be unlocked and then a game booted with the normal Shell boot up process making the unlock totally invisible.

[sickle]

Truth be told, I don't have any PSX with working CD boot right now, which is why there's been a bit of a delay in getting updates out. My bad! Granted I did most of the testing on a 5552 machine (broke CD booting when installing PSIO) but I don't recall having any issues on the 1002 before that.

Been doing PSIO's fastboot code too which has kept me kinda busy, but I've learned a few things along the way and Shadow's got access to machines with different BIOSes, etc so things are still being worked on, some of UniROM's code got a bit of a revamp in the process. (including some fancy new Serial IO code to speed up debug/development, fuckin woo!)

I'll grab another 1002 model when I see one :p

@dragondude:
Sorry man, yeah it looks that way. Kinda frustrating with those EEPROMs that it can't idenfity. Man, I'd love to get the full source to X-Flash

@MottZilla
Smart plan, using the Gameshark CD and all - been meaning to decompile the XPlorer live CD for its boot routine as well. I did make some headway hooking and patching the BIOS boot routine, but It's not even nearly done. So much to do!

[Gradius]

Why not to post the patch here?

[WadeWilson]

I have a couple of questions. Would you recommend scotch tape or opening up the ps1 and putting toilet paper in the spot to keep the button down? Does one work better than the other so the disc can spin? What I mean is that over time I'd assume the tape could get loose and maybe the toilet paper stuffed into the button is a better option?

My other question is, can this play Japanese backups? There's a couple of Japanese games I'm interested in playing and was wondering if this could play them. Isn't japan usually NTSC-J? Is this compatible with your Hack? And on another note, Thank you for all your work.

[vxbinaca]

Siicklebrick,

This mod is awesome. I can take GS and turn it into a PAR or xplorer. Or vice versa, or if the eeprom is large enough Caetla/Unirom. I bought a bunch of bricked GS's and, although I couldn't save most I got a few to boot reliably (the rest need eeprom replacements).

Will you for the next release please include a bunch of other firmware in the xflash image? Perhaps Zippy/Unirom? Perhaps flashable copies of the GS/PAR firmware? One big disc full of firmware?

I have a couple of questions. Would you recommend scotch tape or opening up the ps1 and putting toilet paper in the spot to keep the button down? Does one work better than the other so the disc can spin? What I mean is that over time I'd assume the tape could get loose and maybe the toilet paper stuffed into the button is a better option?

I would recommend a q-tip bent in half and one end shoved into the switch and the other behind the gear/hinge area. After that you can use the same session to swap and re-flash as many Gamesharks as you have.

Don't swap like what's his names video says, just boot the GS with the lid switch held down, wait for it to stop spinning, or just swap if it doesn't spin, start the game without codes and it will boot xflash, then use xflash to re-flash the gameshark.

You can hammer out a bunch of re-flashes in the same go if you have a pile of them like I do.

My other question is, can this play Japanese backups?

This will run whatever. Homebrew, imports, backups, as long as it's a properly formatted PS1 CD (minus the corrupt bits tht CD writers can't reproduce, which is how Playstation games are protected), then it will boot.

[mistamontiel]

Salutations

What device for parallel port must I shop for to install this UniROM ..?

All I wish to do is play Metal Gear Integral , also will need disc swap if that is hopeful working

[Tgames]

Hi,

I have a PAL PS1 SCPH 7502, Xploded (Normal Verion) Flashed with DualBoot UniRom 0.44/Caetla 0.34

Everything works perfectly for backups and imports loading.. but i have problems with Caetla for Cheat Codes.

In the main menu of Caetla when i choose "Cheat Code" with button --> i get a black screen and everything is stuck.

I try :

- Enter in Caetla with "ON" in the Xploded and choose "Cheat Code" -> Black Screen
- Enter in Caetla with "OFF" in the Xploded and boot Caetla with button combinaison and choose "Cheat Code" -> Black Screen.

Also i have trouble with Save Management menu of Caetla, it seem to not responds to button when i choose an option.
But it not freeze in Save Management.

Thanks for future help !

[Administrator]

Sorry I can't help you since I didn't create 'UniROM'.
However, it sounds like CAETLA can't save to the EEPROM because UniROM may have touched or used the available ROM space where CAETLA saves its cheats too. I'll contact Sickle for you directly since I've got his email and Skype number.

[vxbinaca]

The Gameshark units that use SST chips can have their EEPROMs upgraded to the 512k model by chipquiking off the stock eeprom, installing a socket and then dropping in the larger eeprom.

Gamesharks had a lot of design revisions (I've seen cap bodges among other things), and different eeproms. For those that can get access to a lot of gamesharks cheap, it may by work it to convert a bunch to the 512k SST chips with Unirom/Caetela pre-installed (I'd like to see Zippy or some such put on there w/ Unirom).

The bare minimum you can install is UniROM standalone if your EEPROM is supported, but with some work unsupported units can be made to work by chip swaping most of the time. The problem is, I've seen three different package types in the 6 units I have.

Edit:

Upgrading the ATmel untis to larger ATmel eeproms would work too. Also, some of the eeproms aren't marked as SST or ATmel but are. Possibly knockoffs. The DIP package ones should be easy for anyone to replace. GS pro units are the ideal target for playing with, although the old 128k would work too if their eeprom is supported for just booting the discs w/o cheats.

When you first get this, if you want to boot it easy off a stock GS unit, just hold the lid switch and swap after 10 seconds of power on, then start the game without cheats and it will boo the flash disc.

[mistamontiel]

I read somewhere that region cannot be bypassed , such a shame for us terrified to solder

[Aergan]

Salutations

What device for parallel port must I shop for to install this UniROM ..?

All I wish to do is play Metal Gear Integral , also will need disc swap if that is hopeful working

Any Caetla device supporting the CD-ROM browse function should be able to boot Integral / Special Missions without a swap check.

• Boot into Caetla
• Browse into CD-ROM Menu
• Wait for CD-ROM to initialise
• Drop into the MGS sub directory
• Locate & select the real boot file (should match disc identifier e.g. SLES 02136)
• Load it

Photos here: http://imgur.com/a/xHMs1

This takes you straight to the main intro video for the game, no codes, no swaps. Such practices work for GTA London etc too.

[likeabaus]

I read somewhere that region cannot be bypassed , such a shame for us terrified to solder

The CAETLA rom will allow you to bypass region locks, as well as any other swapping method for that matter if you're not comfortable with soldering

[Aergan]

I read somewhere that region cannot be bypassed , such a shame for us terrified to solder

The CAETLA rom will allow you to bypass region locks, as well as any other swapping method for that matter if you're not comfortable with soldering

Won't help with in-game disc swaps for verification / content change though unfortunately, just on boot.

[macche]

Hello, I have just installed unirom in my gameshark.
First I want to thank the author for this great piece of work!!

This is my report:
Psx ntsc 7001 with a gameshark 2.4. Using unirom 0.44 version. Xflash recognizes an SST 256kb chip.
I tried to flash the unirom_caetla.rom, but after the flashing bar has finished, it is reporting that the flash was unsuccessful.
Then I tried the unirom_standalone.rom, and that one worked great.
I am not sure why, even if I have a 256kb version, the caetla version was failing. Anyone has some clue?

Then I tried 2 backup games:
- Ape escape: booting, showing the "SCEA presents" screen, showing the screen that said that an analog pad is required, and then it go into a loop, showing the SCEA screen again, and so on...

- Einhander: black screen

So i followed the MottZilla advice, by loading the gameshark lite first, and then the game.
Using this trick, both of them are actually booting with no issues, so yes, maybe we can incorporate that bootcode into the unirom.

Let me know if you need more info, pictures, or other tests.
Thanks again!!

[Orion_]

Using "nocash unlock" feature, can we use this UniROM on an Action Replay to replace a modchip ?
If it can unlock the CDrom check, this mean that we just need to have an Action Replay with this UniROM and we could play all imported game without modchip ? does this work for CD-R too ?

[sickle]

Again, sorry I've not been able to get on top of everything, little busy lately.

@TGames.

Hmm, y'know I can't remember ever checking if that still worked :S
I did leave that section of the EEPROM blank, but that's maybe the problem. All zeros?

Will have to double check that all the stock stuff works next time, cheers for letting me know.


@vxbinaca


...so many variations.

Not happy with this going on ebay though for a few reasons.
-Its there as a "sometimes working" side feature rather than being the point.
-UniROM itsself is totally not stable
-I'll end up having to provide support for the fucking things :S
TBH I'd rather remove the feature than see it on ebay

@aergan

I remember nocash saying the unlock remains in effect even after the door is opened/closed. Never tried it though, so might work with multi disks.


@macche

Thanks for the feedback. One thing to try if you don't mind?
The unlock is automatic when you boot into caetla. Would you try loading those games fom the CDROM menu for me? Cheers.


@Orion

Yeah, it kinda works on some stuff, but I've not really tested much and can't be bothered maintaining the project as a modchip replacement.



If anyone's in doubt about buying a PSIO btw, omg go for it. Best...damn...thing, so much better than fiddling about with UniROM