Tschicki
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A Custom PlayStation 2 Portable from Scratch
About this Project
This is a PlayStation 2 portable, custom designed from the gound up with a strong focus on ergonomics and usability. It contains presumably world's first custom reverse engineered PS2 mainboard not made by Sony, and is only reusing 6 ICs of an original SCPH-7900x / SCPH-9000x model.The portable plays PS2 game backups natively via OPL or NHDDL, and also supports PS1 games via DKWDRV. The two custom memory card slots are compatible with miniaturized PS2 Memory Cards, SD-Cards (MX4SIO) and a miniaturized SD2PSX.
Development of this project was started in 2022. Funnily enough, this release aligns with the PlayStation 2’s 25th anniversary in Europe!
Links
Features
The full feature list can be found on the Github page, here are the most important points:- Custom reverse engineered PS2 SCPH-90004 mainboard
- Custom FPGA-based video processor developed from scratch in VHDL, for digital video output to a 5-inch 480x800p IPS LCD
- 4.5h of runtime using two 5000mAh 21700 batteries
- Charge & Play via USB-C PD at 5V/9V/15V
- Custom PlayStation 2 BIOS with PS2BBL autoboot
- Custom DualShock 2 gamepad emulator written from scratch
- Hall-effect Nintendo Switch Sticks and PSVITA 2000 buttons
- Rumble
- Custom aluminum heatsink with active, temperature-based cooling and configurable fan curve
- Configuration menu to tune various settings
- I2S audio; stereo speakers and headphone jack
- Two memory card slots, one PS2 USB A connector for accessories
- Fully custom designed and ergonomic housing intended for FDM printing
- Flexible design for easy assembly and disassembly
- Custom SD2PSX for games and saves
Accessories
- A stand for storage and charging
- A travel case to protect the housing on-the-go
- A redesigned SD2PSX in SD-Card size
Pictures
Inside:Mainboard:
Building
The whole project is open source and available on github. The repository includes everything needed to build this portable, and I also spent a lot of time documenting the assembly process.But be warned - this is a very advanced portable to build. You will need a lot of equipment and determination + comprehensive electronics, soldering, troubleshooting and preferably also programming skills to succeed!
Special Thanks
Thanks to the BitBuilt community for reading and commenting the worklog, it really helped to keep the motivation up! And special thanks to:- Mister M and Gman for releasing their PS2 mainboard scans – without them this project would’ve taken much longer!
- Epaminondas for his amazing work on the custom PS2 BIOS. Seriously, you rock!
- stuckpixel for helping out with converting the SPI part of the gamepad emulator to PIO. It’s much more reliable now!
- wisi and mixa232323 for guiding me in the right direction with all the boot ROM shenanigans
- StonedEdge and thedrew for their various suggestions and tips along the way
- All the awesome people working on the SD2PSX, neutrino and NHDDL! It's incredible to see how far the PS2 homebrew scene has come in the last couple of years!
