The PlayStation Portable system software is the official firmware for the PlayStation Portable. It uses the

XrossMediaBar The XrossMediaBar (pronounced "cross-media bar" and officially abbreviated as XMB) is a graphical user interface developed by Sony Computer Entertainment. The interface features icons that are spread horizontally across the screen. Navigation m ...

(XMB) as its

user interface In the industrial design field of human–computer interaction, a user interface (UI) is the space where interactions between humans and machines occur. The goal of this interaction is to allow effective operation and control of the machine f ...

, similar to the

PlayStation 3 The PlayStation 3 (PS3) is a home video game console developed by Sony Computer Entertainment. The successor to the PlayStation 2, it is part of the PlayStation brand of consoles. It was first released on November 11, 2006, in Japan, November ...

console. Updates add new functionality as well as security patches to prevent

unsigned code Code signing is the process of digitally signing executables and scripts to confirm the software author and guarantee that the code has not been altered or corrupted since it was signed. The process employs the use of a cryptographic hash to val ...

from being executed on the system. Updates can be obtained in four ways: *Direct download to the PSP over

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols, based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by radio wav ...

. This can be performed by choosing ettings ystem Updatefrom the XMB. *Download to a PC, then transfer to the PSP via a

USB Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard that establishes specifications for cables, connectors and protocols for connection, communication and power supply (interfacing) between computers, peripherals and other computers. A broad ...

cable or

Memory Stick The Memory Stick is a removable flash memory card format, originally launched by Sony in late 1998. In addition to the original Memory Stick, this family includes the Memory Stick PRO, a revision that allows greater maximum storage capacity an ...

. *Included on the UMD of some games. These games may not run with earlier firmware than the version on their UMD. See also List of PlayStation Portable system software compatibilities. *Download from a PS3 to a PSP system via USB cable. (Japanese and American version only) While system software updates can be used with consoles from any region, Sony recommends only downloading system software updates released for the region corresponding to the system's place of purchase. System software updates have added various features including a

web browser A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used o ...

, Adobe Flash Player 6 support, additional codecs for images, audio, and video, PlayStation 3 connectivity, as well as patches against several security exploits, vulnerabilities, and execution of homebrew programs. The battery must be at least 50% charged or else the system will prevent the update from installing. If the power supply is lost while writing to the system software, the console will no longer be able to operate unless the system is booted in service mode or sent to Sony for repair if still under warranty. The current version of the software, 6.61, was made available on January 15, 2015. It is a minor update released more than three years after the release of the previous version 6.60 in 2011.

Technology

Graphical shell

The PlayStation Portable uses the

(XMB) as its

graphical user interface The GUI ( "UI" by itself is still usually pronounced . or ), graphical user interface, is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicator such as primary notation, inst ...

, which is also used in the

(PS3) console, a variety of Sony

BRAVIA Bravia (stylized as BRAVIA) is a brand of Sony Visual Products Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony Corporation, and used for its television products. Its backronym is "Best Resolution Audio Visual Integrated Architecture". All Sony high-defi ...

HDTV High-definition television (HD or HDTV) describes a television system which provides a substantially higher image resolution than the previous generation of technologies. The term has been used since 1936; in more recent times, it refers to the g ...

Blu-ray The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of st ...

disc players and many more

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professiona ...

products. XMB displays icons horizontally across the screen that be seen as categories. Users can navigate through them using the left and right buttons of the

D-pad A D-pad (short for directional pad or digital pad; officially referred to by Nintendo as a +Control Pad) is a flat, usually thumb-operated, often digital, four-way directional control with one button on each point, found on nearly all modern vid ...

, which move the icons forward or back across the screen, highlighting just one at a time, as opposed to using any kind of pointer to select an option. When one category is selected, there are usually more specific options then available to select that are spread vertically above and below the selected icon. Users may navigate among these options by using the up and down buttons of the D-pad. The basic features offered by XMB implementations varies based on device and software version. On the PSP console, the XMB had top level icons for Photos, Music, Videos, Games, Networking (which allows the use of the

), Settings and Extras. Also, XMB offers a degree of multitasking. With the PSP, using the Home button while playing music would allow users to browse photos without stopping the music. While XMB proved to be a successful user interface for Sony products such as PSP and PS3, the next generation Sony

video game console A video game console is an electronic device that outputs a video signal or image to display a video game that can be played with a game controller. These may be home consoles, which are generally placed in a permanent location connected to ...

s such as the PlayStation 4 and the PlayStation Vita no longer use this user interface. For example, the XMB is replaced by the LiveArea interface on the PS Vita.

Web browser

The PlayStation Portable comes with a

for browsing the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

. The web browser is a version of the NetFront browser made by Access Co. Ltd. and was released for free with the 2.00 system software update. The browser supports most common web technologies, such as HTTP cookies,

form Form is the shape, visual appearance, or configuration of an object. In a wider sense, the form is the way something happens. Form also refers to: *Form (document), a document (printed or electronic) with spaces in which to write or enter data ...

s, CSS, as well as basic

JavaScript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language that is one of the core technologies of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. As of 2022, 98% of websites use JavaScript on the client side for webpage behavior, of ...

capabilities. The version 2.50 upgrade added Unicode (UTF-8)

character encoding Character encoding is the process of assigning numbers to Graphics, graphical character (computing), characters, especially the written characters of Language, human language, allowing them to be Data storage, stored, Data communication, transmi ...

and Auto-Select as options in the browser's encoding menu, and also introduced the saving of input history for online forms. Version 2.70 of the PSP's system software introduced basic

Flash Flash, flashes, or FLASH may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional aliases * Flash (DC Comics character), several DC Comics superheroes with super speed: ** Flash (Barry Allen) ** Flash (Jay Garrick) ** Wally West, the first Kid F ...

capabilities to the browser. However, the player runs Flash version 6, five iterations behind the current desktop version 11, making some websites difficult to view. There are three different rendering modes: "Normal", "Just-Fit", and "Smart-Fit". "Normal" will display the page with no changes, "Just-Fit" will attempt to shrink some elements to make the whole page fit on the screen and preserve layout and "Smart-Fit" will display content in the order it appears in the HTML, and with no size adjustments; instead it will drop an element down below the preceding element if it starts to go off the screen. The browser also has basic

tabbed browsing In interface design, a tab is a graphical user interface object that allows multiple documents or panels to be contained within a single window, using tabs as a navigational widget for switching between sets of documents. It is an interface s ...

capabilities, with a maximum of three tabs. When a website tries to open a link in a new window, the browser opens it in a new tab. Parents can limit content by enabling Browser Start Up Control which blocks all access to the web browser and creating a 4-digit PIN under ettingsin ecurity Additionally, the browser can be configured to run under a

proxy server In computer networking, a proxy server is a server application that acts as an intermediary between a client requesting a resource and the server providing that resource. Instead of connecting directly to a server that can fulfill a reques ...

and can be protected by the security PIN to enable the use of web filtering or monitoring software through a network. Recently, TrendMicro for PSP was added as a feature that can be enabled via a subscription to filter or monitor content on the PSP. The PSP browser is slower compared to modern browsers and often runs

out of memory Out of memory (OOM) is an often undesired state of computer operation where no additional memory can be allocated for use by programs or the operating system. Such a system will be unable to load any additional programs, and since many programs ...

due to limitations put in place by Sony. Alternatively, homebrew alternatives to the browser have been released that utilize all 32/64 MB of the PSP's RAM, which allows the browser to load pages faster and have more memory for larger pages. Opera Mini can also be used on PSP through PSPKVM, a homebrew application which is a Sun Java Virtual Machine. It was claimed to provide much faster loading times than the default browser and provides better web page compatibility.

Other features

Like many other

s, the PlayStation Portable is capable of photo, audio, and video playback in a variety of formats. However, unlike Sony's

home consoles A home video game console is a video game console that is designed to be connected to a display device, such as a television, and an external power source as to play video games. Home consoles are generally less powerful and customizable than ...

such as the

and the PlayStation 4, it is not possible to play

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

movies on the PlayStation Portable directly since it lacks a standard Blu-ray or DVD drive. While it does have a UMD drive and there exist UMD movies, the UMD format never saw implementation on any device other than the PlayStation Portable and as a result, the market is very limited compared to those for other optical media formats. There have been no more movies released on UMD since 2011, with

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 ''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2'' is a 2011 fantasy film directed by David Yates from a screenplay by Steve Kloves. The film is the second of two cinematic parts based on the 2007 novel ''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallow ...

being one of the final releases on the format. The PlayStation Portable also supports a feature known as Remote Play, which allows the PSP to access many features of a

console from a remote location using the PS3's

WLAN A wireless LAN (WLAN) is a wireless computer network that links two or more devices using wireless communication to form a local area network (LAN) within a limited area such as a home, school, computer laboratory, campus, or office buildin ...

capabilities, a home network, or the

. However, unlike the later Remote Play feature between the PlayStation Vita and the PlayStation 4, the Remote Play capabilities between the PSP and the PS3 are much more limited. Although most of the PS3's capabilities related to its main user interface are accessible with Remote Play, playback of

s, Blu-ray Discs, PlayStation 2 games, most

games, and copy-protected files stored on the PS3's hard drive are not supported. Actual Remote Play between the PSP and the PS3 games are only supported by a "select" very few PS3 titles. Furthermore, PSP-2000, PSP-3000, and PSP-N1000 can use the

Skype Skype () is a proprietary telecommunications application operated by Skype Technologies, a division of Microsoft, best known for VoIP-based videotelephony, videoconferencing and voice calls. It also has instant messaging, file transfer, deb ...

VoIP Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also called IP telephony, is a method and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. The terms Internet t ...

service starting with system software version 3.90. The service allows Skype calls to be made over

and on the PSP Go over the

Bluetooth Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). In the most widely used mode, transmission power is limi ...

Modem feature. It is not possible to use the VoIP service on the original PSP-1000 console due to hardware limitations. There also existed other services for the PSP such as the Room for PlayStation Portable, similar to the PlayStation 3's online community-based service known as

PlayStation Home PlayStation Home was a virtual 3D social gaming platform developed by Sony Computer Entertainment's London Studio for the PlayStation 3 (PS3) on the PlayStation Network (PSN). It was accessible from the PS3's XrossMediaBar (XMB). Membership was ...

SensMe SensMe is a proprietary music mood and tempo detection system created by Sony Corporation, and employed in numerous Sony branded products, including in some Walkman digital music players, the Media Go application, the PlayStation Portable, and Sony ...

channels for music files was added to the PSP starting with firmware version 6.10.PSP Firmware Update (v6.10) http://blog.us.playstation.com/2009/09/psp-firmware-update-v6-10/ Also, SHOUTCast Radio can be listened to via an inbuilt app on most PSPs.

Custom firmware

Homebrew development was very popular during the time of the PlayStation Portable. Besides the official firmware (OFW) made by

custom firmware Custom firmware, also known as aftermarket firmware, is an unofficial new or modified version of firmware created by third parties on devices such as video game consoles and various embedded device types to provide new features or to unlock hidden ...

(also written as Custom Firmware, or simply CFW) is also commonly seen in the PlayStation Portable handheld consoles. Custom firmware allows the running of unsigned code such as homebrew applications, UMD .ISO files,

emulators In computing, an emulator is hardware or software that enables one computer system (called the ''host'') to behave like another computer system (called the ''guest''). An emulator typically enables the host system to run software or use peri ...

for other consoles and PS1 games when the disc images are converted into an EBOOT file. This is in stark contrast to the official system software, where only code that has been signed by Sony can run. Notable custom firmware versions include the M33 Custom Firmware by Dark_AleX as well as those made by others such as the Custom Firmware 5.50GEN series, Minimum Edition (ME/LME) CFW and the PRO CFW. All legally and illegally obtained content can be played on custom firmware, assuming that it is at the latest version (currently 6.61). During the early days of the PSP hacking scene, it was discovered that firmware 1.00 allowed unsigned code to run. While this firmware only existed on PSP-1000 models from Japan, many users imported these models to run and develop homebrew. An exploit was later discovered in firmware 1.50 that also allowed unsigned code to run. This opened up North American PSP-1000 systems for homebrew. Firmware 1.5 acted as the standard firmware for homebrew until the creation of eLoaders (which use various exploits to launch a homebrew "menu"), savegame exploits in games such as Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories and Lumines: Puzzle Fusion and eventually DarkAlex's custom firmware releases, which all allowed PSPs shipped after the 1.51 update's release to run homebrew. Sony had put significant effort into blocking custom firmware and other third party devices/content from the PSP, but their effort was in vain. In July 2007 Dark_AleX officially stopped his work on the PSP, citing perceived problems with Sony as one of the reasons for his departure, but other custom firmware versions continue to be developed or updated. In 2015, a homebrew tool known as Infinity was developed which allows users to permanently install CFW such as LME or PRO on all PSP models. This tool requires firmware 6.60 or 6.61.

References

{{Video game console system software

Software Software is a set of computer programs and associated software documentation, documentation and data (computing), data. This is in contrast to Computer hardware, hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. ...

Game console operating systems Mobile operating systems Proprietary operating systems