It has finally be done, or someone has reported it finally being done. Hacker George Hotz is claiming that he has finally hacked into a PS3. The system has been notoriously hard to get into, and until now no one has been able to do it. The reason this isn't confirmed yet is because Hotz isn't releasing how he hacked the system, stating that, "As far as the exploit goes, I'm not revealing it yet. The theory isn't really patchable, but they can make implementations much harder. Also, for obvious reasons I can't post dumps. I'm hoping to find the decryption keys and post them, but they may be embedded in hardware."
I don't actually know what any of that means, but according to Hotz it was none too easy to get into the PS3 even though he claims it only took him five total weeks to do it. He describes the PS3 as "very simple hardware cleverly applied, and some not so simple software." It's your choice whether or not you want to believe him, but the man has some street cred since he was the first guy to hack the iPhone 2G. From what I can glean from the interwebs, this is really a very solid move forward in terms of hacking, but is in no way an open pass to start doing whatever you want to a PS3.
Dtoid hackers more in the know than I, is this a big deal or just a baby step?
GeoHot Hacked the Sony Playstation 3 [iHackintosh, via Gizmodo, via Kotaku]
Matthew Razak is Destructoid's Associate editor and co-founder of film site
Flixist. He began as community member "cowzilla" and was since sequestered to write brainy features material. He lives in Los Angeles with his beautiful wife.
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Contest:
3:00 AM on 01.25.2010
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I miss Dark Alex.
Dark Alex is gone? Did he quit or something, or did Sony finally get him? I haven't paid attention to the PSP modding scene since mine got stolen, but he was like, THE GUY when it came to PSP hacks.
i dont necessarily find the use of hacking a ps3. why? so i can wait years while i download gigabytes worth of game files, burn them on to (not cheap) dual layer blu ray disks, put it in my ps3 and wait while it installs to play a game thats not necessarily anything special...?
once you get uncharted and gow3 where else is the point of the system?
PS3 exclusives like MAG?
Oh I went there!
He probably set his sights on the PS3 after so many others failed to crack it but the layer of security in the PS3 must be mind boggling if he took apart the iPhone in hours and it took him 5 weeks to split open the PS3.
If the details hes revealed are true though this is a big deal since he approached the hardware side. Basically you won't be able to patch this up with a firmware update as it is an exploit in the hardware and not the software.
It also means you probably won't be able to burn blu-ray discs you'll have to play games from the hard drive as a side effect but I think some people will prefer that anyway.
This is a huge deal though.
one suggestion would be emulation of older consoles. imagine running your snes or megadrive ROM collection all from your ps3 to your TV.
Hacking consoles, although interesting does nothing for the games industry. It's a step backwards if anything.
I enjoy buying my PS3 games, I enjoyed downloading my PS2 games, but they were ten-a-penny, devs now spend so much making these games that they need our purchases to survive.
There's something scummy about those guys with a hacked 360 and a wallet full of hooky DVD's. I like to have a nice legit collection of proper games in proper cases with full (online) functionality.
I call upon Master Hotz to retract his ludicrous statement of lies and rubbish and give proper credit where it is due: upon my feet, before I serve him a summons to the courts for a proper--and most assuredly legal--thrashing.
Him talking to a girl will do nothing for the world. Him hacking a PS3 will get him some notoriety, and make many people happy that they can finally begin to think about creating homebrew on the ps3. This might also lead to ps2 emulation, taken from the games you can download. Just like the PS1 functionality on PSP got hacked, so you could do it with any game.
no..but maybe RAY_UNCHARTED_3_PARADOX_AUDIO_MOVIES_MP_RIPPED_20_GB.img^^
no I think some jackasses want pirated games on a ps3..yeah...
but imagine the homebrew storm....software...maybe other os support on a slim...emulators. The ps3 has power for a DC..gamecube..and even ps2 games.
When I had my PSP (R.I.Pieces), I was lucky to own the first 1.50 ones.
And I remember how long it took to crack the 2.00 firmware.
It was really nice after that.
You had text editors, html editors, paint-like tools,
pdf reader etc.... it was so cool! Not even my smartphone had features like this.
Emulators run perfectly!
I hope to see some nice stuff in the future, but on the other side,
Sony will be after the firmwares now (updates every two weeks like in the PSP hacking times before), and when you brick your console,
you can forget the support.And we know all that the PS3 can be bricked very easily, even by Sony itself.
And Matthew, it's none "too" easy.
If PS3 is hacked, I'll assume PS3 hardware sales will skyrocket in developing countries. Sony better be making money from hardware sales.
And no, it wasn't my PS3.
Not that I condone piracy or anything. Not at the moment, anyway.
@AstrealDrmz, beyond emulation of 16bit era and PSX that is a ridiculous thing to expect.
Geohot's iPhone/iTouch jailbreak hack, blackra1n, is freaking fantastic. Unlike redsn0w or any of those, all it takes to use blackra1n is hooking up a device and pressing one button. No resets or complicated instructions, one. freaking. button. The homebrew stuff on the iPhone is fantastic, I can use crypto like openPGP, SSH, SCUMMVM, and one Zelda theme for Winterboard is one of the greatest things, ever.
All in all, it's your hardware, do what you want with it - but if you're a pirate instead of an explorer, you better know how to take your licks. If you're going to be dumb, you gotta be tough.
If this allows more dirty cheap hackers playing online (and with minimum risk of catching the banhammer) won't this push more people away from the ps3 and onto the 360?
Not flame baiting by the way, so no need to hand me my asbestos suit.
I'm also of the same opinion as sexychoc, I enjoy keeping it legit... the hacking scene on the PSP got boring quickly for me. It devalued games, and I for one, don't want my games devaluing.
Though that'd be cool.
In my case, I don't want blu-ray backups, all I want is emulation, GBA, SNES, PS1, PS2, gamecube, even the original xbox, jaguar, dreamcast, etc, gimme emulators and I'll be happy.
In case you didn't read the actual post on geohots blog. He says "very simple hardware cleverly applied, and some not so simple software." Which means you would still need to either open your ps3 or install some crazy piece of hardware, which is always not cool. Who would void warranty, forfeit free online and probably mess up a perfectly good 300$ system?
I mean I confess I did do it with the ps2 but the hacks were REALLY easy to do, I just can't see why would anyone wanna go through the hassle of applying the hack, buying a bluray burner, buying expensive bluray discs and then still wait like 15 hours for your 45 GB download...
That's...retarded.
not flame baiting. I lol! Bs.
PS3 becomes hackable so people jump ship to move to the already hacktastic 360?
Doubt it dude.
Don't forget, it's VERY unlikely that anyone will be able to play a hacked console online, ala the 360 (to an extent).
At the very worst we'll get an influx of hooky Ps3's playing SP only games.
read: PSP piracy - (single player-centric) and read: 360 hacked consoles being banned from online.
Sure Sony don't ban people using a flaw in a game's code to get a bit of an advantage, but playing a copied/hooky game? i'm pretty sure the banhammer will arrive. if you can even get online with a copied game....
@vApathyv
I think he was actually chased out of the hacking scene. It was some crazy shit but the details are fuzzy for me.
If I DL more than 2gb in either of two "peak time" periods (9am-3pm or 4pm-9pm) - the UPLOAD limit is super tight too, don't you even dare think of uploading a youtube video before 9pm. - If i do DL 2gb in either of those timeslots, my 20mb/s broadband that i fucking pay for, will be cut to just under 2mb/s.
So a 50gb Blu-ray rip would not be a friend of my connection, at least not before 9pm.
It's a cunt having to watch when you use your bandwidth when you pay for UNLIMITED broadband.
Usage limits that can be reached in moments on the speed provided are out of order. I could reach my usage limit (on my UNLIMITED) broadband in 3.33 minutes with a suitably fast source.
Time then to move to the 50Mbit line then eh?
I don't get hammered as much since I moved off. They are trialling 200Mbit as well.....
Seriously though Virgin shouldn't be selling their 10mb/s and 20mb/s packages as unlimited.
200mb/s - awesome. I make my buddies jealous enough with my 20mb/s, so 200 would make them GREEN!
Yeah.
Yes they allowed Linux but they locked access to the RSX chip and subsequently the OTHER 256 MB of RAM the PS3 has. So a 6 core processor with 1/8th of the RAM of my netbook can't even run a video on it. Hell, try running anything other than a bare bones Gnome distro and you will get stuttering.
So NOW we can see what the hardware can do. I am looking forward to making it a proper linux machine now.
@x1251
The 80GB PS3s had emulated PS2 compatibility. The emotion engine was only in the launch models. This hack allows people to get it back...Theoretically.