… or writing a blog post with old pics and data again
Intro
Yeah, again, a blog post based on years-old pics. I still have at least 20 blog posts to write that will be based on stuff that I’ve worked few years ago 😀
I guess, chasing my own tail is never-ending 😀
Some Playstations that I bought the other day…
I once wrote a blog post about Nintendo Wii controllers. That post was already based on old data, and the job presented in this blog post is from roughly the same period of time when I bought around 60 various consoles to learn how to fix them and to show them to my son.
I had around 9 PlayStation 2 units. Seven were the FAT PS2s, and I will be covering only fixes/mods that I find a bit more interesting than the usual clean&run scenario. Obviously, a lot of time passed, and nowadays there are way better mods available, but anyway, let’s go.
Lemme first show you how it all looked.
The main issues to sort out were rather simple. Cleaning, broken plastic, dead fans, dead RTC battery cells, etc.
Below are some pics after disassembly.
Broken thermal pads everywhere.
A bit of corrosion here and there.
Fixes
PS2 motherboards are well-manufactured and generally free from issues. In my case, all was working fine.
However, I had to clean them nicely, replace the original Sony batteries, and replace thermal pads.
Some pics below.
Replacing thermal pads.
Some drives needed a new laser module. The original is KHS-400C, but replacements are still available.
I’ve bought some on Aliexpress.
Some plastic parts had to be restored to be fully functional. I’ve used acetone, some wire reinforcement, and a soldering iron to fix it.
One of the drives had a chipped-off plastic rail. I’ve temporarily glued “sides” that served as a mold-in-place, filled it with a mix of sodium bicarbonate and cyanoacrylic glue, and used a hand file to trim it to the desired shape.
Meanwhile, cleaned cases were waiting 🙂
Next, I had to address issues with power switches. Connectors were tarnished, so I had to disassemble them and clean the contacts.
After that, I was ready to assemble all units and start adding some mods.
Mods
The mods are rather basic and mandatory in modern days, and have also been covered many times on YouTube. It all basically boils down to the installation of FMCB or FHDB, which is a great solution!
To make it work, I needed some hard drives, memcards, and HDD adapters.
I’ve bought some brand new 1TB SATA drives along with HDD adapters that are easily available. I had a bit of trouble finding nice and original memcards, but that was sorted out, too.
Next, I had to prepare a drive to work nicely with PS2. For testing purposes, I’ve used a 2.5-inch drive in a 3D printed bracket.
Software used back then to format the drive is Window HDL Image Install Program V1.7.6 By Gadgetfreak
After the above, I’ve used the HDD Raw copy tool to put a downloaded FHDB image.
IIRC, this can also be done from the FMCB menu under running PS2, but I wanted to test a PC software.
Now, you can dump images of your original games and put them on the hard drive.
Controllers
I had quite a few controllers, but I needed to test them first and fix them if broken.
Having a working PS2 with FMCB or FHDB is handy, as I could upload a PS2 controller tester by jbit_ and check all the pads.
Some controllers are originally painted with a rubber-like cover that, unfortunately, degrades with time and becomes a sticky gooey. I usually deal with it with the help of Methanol. It nicely removes it. However, such a cleaned surface has to be painted with an undercoating and the desired color afterward. This is exactly what I did with one set of controllers that I had.
Finale
Out of the six PS2 consoles, I’ve created 6 sets in the following configuration:
- PS2 FAT – new RTC battery, new thermal pads, laser module
- 1TB SATA HDD + HDD adapter
- original 8MB Sony memcard
- new power wire
- Controller
- PS2HDMI dongle
Unfortunately, nobody wanted to buy these even for a cost that would cover all the expenses spent on this project. On the bright side, I have learned a lot, plus, I have a cool PS2 to play with 🙂
Outro
See you in the next post. Hopefully, about the machine that I’ve worked on recently, and I still remember all the details 😀