Submitted by The PlayStation 3. For a long time, it was a rather well-protected machine, and it wasn’t until early this year that George Hotz finally managed to crack the thing wide open. In essence, it was now possible to jailbreak the PlayStation 3 like you would jailbreak your iPhone, but of course, Sony wasn’t pleased. With the recent firmware update, v3.50, Sony went from surgical precision to the battle axe – they blocked all non-Sony USB devices controllers (and a lot of PS2 > PS3 controller adapters) from working.
Sony is pretty much being thrown into every corner of the ring during its fight with the jailbreak community. The PlayStation 3 has been hacked using any imaginable USB peripheral; you can jailbreak it using an iPod, Pandora, Dingoo, and, as a final uppercut in Sony’s face, using its very own PlayStation 3 controller.
While that last one requires a little soldering, it’s still pretty awesome. Practical? No. Symbolic value? High. Sadly, it’s as of yet unclear whether or not the controller hack is blocked by version 3.50 of the firmware, but if it isn’t, Sony might be in for a bit of trouble since blocking its own controller from working would be, uh, unfortunate.
Part of the problem lies with Sony itself. Microsoft has been much more accommodating to independent developers with the Xbox360 and XNA, while all Sony had to offer was a limited way of running Linux – a feature it removed from all PlayStation models earlier this year.
While Sony is busy fighting jailbreakers and removing genuine features in the process, Microsoft is launching a brand new Xbox system software update (later this year) with a new user interface, and a completely new audio codec and infrastructure for much clearer Xbox Live chat. In the meantime, Sony still hasn’t introduced cross-game chat.
Way to listen to your users, Sony. Keep it up. There’s a reason your PS3 has been number three consistently.
Of all the devices used to jailbreak the PS3 the TI-84 graphing calculator was my favorite.
I never did the system update that blocked running Linux but I haven’t jailbreaked my PS3 either. I wanna wait and see where things go.
No reason for me to jailbreak it right now.
I suppose I’ll wait for a good XBMC port.
Okay, I have been an OSNews reader for many many years now but I never bothered to register. Only now, because this article just screams for some clarifications.
1) The guy is named Hotz, not Holtz
2) The jailbreak with the PS3 controller is simply a (bad) hack re-using the USB port on the controller. I.e. someone took an USB dev board and piggybacked it on the controller’s USB pins. No magic here.
3) The reported blocking of non-Sony devices is targeted at bootleg controllers (there are lots of people reporting success using non-Sony USB devices with the latest firmware). Since the exploit kicks in long before the system has booted (and since it uses fake USB IDs not tied to Sony) it will most certainly not be affected by the block. If it would, Sony would be blocking out their own USB jig devices which they probably don’t want to.
-Darkstar
I did not know kdawson started to write for OSNews too.
they blocked all non-Sony USB devices from working.
Unlicensed third-party controllers. Not all non-Sony devices.
and, as a final uppercut in Sony’s face, using its very own PlayStation 3 controller.
It works by soldering the PSGroove into a controller… I can demo jailbreaking my ps3 with an iron! I just need to glue a USB flash drive inside it.
Microsoft is launching a brand new Xbox system software update (later this year) with a new user interface, and a completely new audio codec and infrastructure for much clearer Xbox Live chat
Oh right, it’s just an advert for XBox! Relevance to article, 0.0%
If you wanted to highlight the workarounds console producers create to stop running non-licensed code, you’d mention all parties and their methods. Sony is just doing exactly as every other party has already done.
It shows that unlike Sony, Microsoft is actually delivering new features and improvements, while Sony is much busier REMOVING them in their fight against jailbreaking, while at the same time, ignoring popular feature requests like cross-game chat or an XNA-esque development environment.
Very much relevant. It shows what happens when companies are more concerned with [inevitably failing] DRM techniques than with listening to customers.
Edited 2010-09-27 14:34 UTC
They’ve added plenty since the console launched, and even the recent update added features (3D Blu-ray support). Just because you don’t think it’s worthy to be added doesn’t mean it isn’t an added feature.
This is misinformation at its best. I can understand you are angry at the stance Sony took with OtherOS (I beat you there… I was angry when they detailed Other OS limitations, I felt it was gimped to begin with… also, the PS3 homebrew scene was not even remotely as strong as the communities behind NetYaroze and PS2Linux were), but such comments are not informative at all. They are factually wrong too.
Compare PS3’s OS and SDK features from the platform’s launch and today.
That must be why hackers left the Xbox 360 alone…
.
Edited 2010-09-27 15:11 UTC
The news is still wrong, by the way. Sony didn’t block *all* unlicensed controllers, in fact most of them still work:
http://kotaku.com/5647430/nyko-says-their-controllers-work-fine-wit…
http://kotaku.com/5647346/ps3-update-has-killed-three-old-mad-catz-…
Sony’s official explanation:
http://kotaku.com/5646780/sony-blocks-fake-controllers-warns-of-exp…
Of course, in practice there’s no proof that the change introduced in firmware 3.50 is related in any way to the exploit that was fixed in firmware 3.42.
You’d also be interested to know the Xbox 360 has been hacked before for homebrew use and Microsoft did the exact same thing as Sony is doing now: they released an updated firmware that fixed the exploit.
Despite your complaining on Apple and Sony fixing these exploits pretty much every manufacture of closed devices like these do the exact same thing. Consumers should have cared before they bought a DRM-restricted device.
Yes, Thom is obviously pro x360 and anti PS3 to the extent that he becomes a hypocrite. The article is an ‘advertorial’ more than anything else. Microsoft has banned tons of users from xbox live but that gets conveniently swept under the carpet while Sony is painted as anti-consumer with their PS3 protection measures.
Also, I’d like to see some world numbers on PS3<->X360, in Japan atleast PS3 readily outsells x360. This whole article smells fishy from beginning to end.
Yes, because I never criticised Microsoft for its practices regarding the Xbox 360… Oh wait.
http://www.osnews.com/story/22788/Microsoft_Cites_Psystar_Case_in_X…
Thom, I do not think your integrity is in question here. I do not think you are trolling Sony or biased towards Microsoft (or Apple
). My beef is that what you have stated is not true.
Informed criticism = GOOD.
Uninformed criticism = BAD.
That post of yours in this thread is an example of the latter.
Edited 2010-09-27 16:08 UTC
He’s showing it as an example. Of course Sony added some features, but I do not remember any manyfacturere removing so many features from a device before (linux support, 2 usb ports, ps2 support, 3rd party controllers, sacd support, etc).
On the other hand, it’s important that PS3 was hacked, only after sony had removed the Linux capability.
There is a good informational presentation on YouTube that discusses Xbox security system, and in the middle, they mention every console has been hacked by homebrew developers, then pirates, and PS3 was not hacked since it already supported homebrew from get go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxjpmc8ZIxM
I guess these exploits open up the flood gates for piracy on PS3, something which x360 has suffered from very early on in it’s lifespan. Here in sweden there seems to be a very high ratio of ‘modded’ x360’s (just my personal observation, may very well be totally wrong). Either way, PS3’s protection was a decent one since it lasted this long I guess.
First of all, GeoHot didn’t “crack open” the PS3. He did some impressive stuff, but if you read carefully his articles and the comments from other members of the scene, he didn’t actually crack much.
Second, the PSJailbreak/PSGroove device has nothing to do with what GeoHot did in the first place. It’s rumored that he’s behind PSJailbreak but it’s just a rumour. The device exploits a backdoor that was always there, designed for PS3 repair shops.
Thom, I get your point that MSFT managed to grab lots of attention with XNA and I agree that Sony seems way too focused in preventing piracy instead of bringing valuable features to its custumers. But this is just poor writing and screams “uninformed”.
First of all, GeoHot didn’t “crack open” the PS3. He did some impressive stuff, but if you read carefully his articles and the comments from other members of the scene, he didn’t actually crack much.
Indeed. GeoHot managed to get inside the hypervisor, but there was still lots of hurdles ahead before he could f.ex. gain complete access to the Blu-Ray drive, and there were parts of the hypervisor too that he didn’t have access to. As such it’s quite a far cry from “wide open.”
The device exploits a backdoor that was always there, designed for PS3 repair shops.
To clarify on this for those who are not familiar with the subject: there is a hidden feature in PS3 that once triggered places it in debug mode. Debug mode allows you to run unauthorized code, doesn’t seem to place limits on what you can do and so on, and is triggered via USB-ports.
As for GeoHot’s involvement: I’ve only seen unsubstantiated rumours about that, nothing I’d personally believe. It’s more likely that someone got access to the devices used in the real repair shops and disassembled it, and has no connection to GeoHot.
Thom, I get your point that MSFT managed to grab lots of attention with XNA and I agree that Sony seems way too focused in preventing piracy instead of bringing valuable features to its custumers. But this is just poor writing and screams “uninformed”.
Well, I suppose the comments section is a good thing then? Even Thom is just a single person, not omnipotent, and thus it’s good that it’s so easy to correct things here.
PS3 jailbreak has little common with JIG device – vendor IDs.
Wrong. Device exploits PS3 via buffer overflow in USB stack. What, most likely, became possible after GeoHot’s firmware dump, as it operates with precise memory locations of data and code.
Microsoft are just as bad, they spend a lot of time and effort to stop jailbreaking and various other things. Look how closed microsoft are with their hdd setup. With the PS3 i can simply slot in a new one, with Microsoft i have to purchase a branded microsoft one else i get my console banned. There was also a whohar regarding madkatx and their memory cards for the xbox and how Microsoft had banned them. Don’t get me wrong, i love my xbox, but every console maker out there is the same, they are all trying to lock down their machines as much as possible (Wii/PS3/360).
“they blocked all non-Sony USB devices from working”
Which is the basis of the reason why I never buy anything with a Sony badge on it, nor will I buy into any other brand that uses propriety formats.
And this is why it’s important to read articles linked from reports, rather than the report itself. Clue: OSNews is wrong.
You mean you base your purchasing decisions on false information?
So…I’m confused. How does XNA make things more open to “hackers”? I thought XNA was a GAME developer program. Oh wait, cause it is and it is in no way related to or makes sense to compare it to the removal of the “Other OS” feature. As far as cross game chat goes. I don’t think its a situation of them not listening to their user base. I believe its an issue of some closed door politics between Sony and their 3rd parties and QA issues.
Further more, as a launch owner, I can tell you that Sony has added many new features to the PS3/PSN since then that are all valued by GAMERS. Should you want to run Linux I would like to direct consumers to this thing called a PC. I hear this device actually runs the OS very well. …Really, its like buying a Pinto and getting pissed off that a Porsche engine won’t fit into it.
…I don’t get why the media must inject SO MUCH negativity into what ever SCEA does. Yet, MS pushes out one of the worst made products I have seen in my LIFE, charges OUTLANDISH prices for add-ons and has the balls to inject ads into a paid service and everyone seems to get amnesia…..GAH!!!
Personally I’m glad to see you have “stuck it” to MS for their practices but this article is very much “stretched” anger.
Edited 2010-09-27 16:16 UTC
At the time of launch, the PS3 hardware was a beast of a thing. What’s wrong with people wanting to use an officially advertised feature like OtherOS. Is the desire to use the hardware with a non-stock OS really that bad? Is it really such an offense that institutions used PS3/*nix clusters?
In terms of Pinto versus Porche, it’s not really complaining about a Porche engine not fitting into the Pinto chassis at all. Originally, the Porche engine fit into the Pinto just fine. This analogy is more like Sony recalling all the Pintos and purposefully adding some extra bolts in the engine block mounting so that a Porche engine will no longer fit in the chassis. It’s not complaining because your Pinto won’t house a Porche engine, it’s complaining because it worked just fine with a Porche engine until the Pinto manufacturer pulled an after-market bait and switch sabotaging the use of a Porche engine.
As far as i know, MS have never taken away a documented feature of the xbox 360 from existing customers.
Quality control is another matter entirely, but thats down to incompetence rather than malicious intentions and it has cost them millions in extended warranty repairs.
The idea that i can buy a product which is advertised by its producer as performing various tasks, and then some time down the line be told by that same producer that if i want to continue using feature X i have to sacrifice feature Y or vice-versa is EXTREMELY insulting.
-Make a good to excellent device
-Cripple it in the name of copy “protection”. Include memory stick cards too, when possible. Everyone loves MS
-Sell it
-Repeat
Sony are always doing things this way. They survive because their engineers are talented to the point that the benefits of owning the devices may often overcome the drawbacks of their approach…
At least that is what I would expect if I bought one. If it were possible to do other things with them, such as load Linux, then that would be gravy. The only reason I would be angry after purchasing such a device is if the maker sold me the device with feature X enabled and advertised, and then removed it later. (I haven’t kept up with this enough to know if Sony in fact did this in removing the OtherOS feature).
As for Sony — they have a long history of this sort of thing. They were presumptuous enough about their DRM to install a rootkit on peoples’ PCs, for God’s sake. Non-technical users probably don’t know this, and I feel for them if they bought a PS3 without knowing this, but then again those users aren’t the ones trying to jailbreak or run Linux on their PS3s. Technically-inclined users, on the other hand, should probably have been aware of Sony’s past behavior and at least taken it into account when purchasing a PS3. That doesn’t necessarily make Sony’s actions right, but at least it would have saved those users some disappointment. The same probably applies to Microsoft and Nintendo as well.
I’ve never bought a console, primarily because it is a single-function device, unlike, say, a PC. I had just about justified buying a PS3 (to use as console and Myth frontend) when Sony discontinued it and removed the 3rd-party app functionality, so I saved my money. Easier to build a frontend PC than play tit-for-tat with Sony.
Sony initially marketed it, long beforee even the first teaser photos made it to magazines, as the center of your home’s work and entertainment. They wanted people to buy it thinking it was more of a home computer than a game console. If Sony had just pursued this, and did it early, with things like productivity apps in their store, the PS3 would probably be outselling the 360 outside Japan, despite the originally extortionate price tag. Even now that they’re relatively even priced, people still think of the PS3 as expensive cpmpared to the 360.
Frankly, I wonder about the extent to which the personalities of the jailbreakers themselves is to blame for the response of Sony. From the beginning, their attitude wasn’t “let’s recreate OtherOS so that we can keep puttering around with bargain-basement HPC solutions” but “We’re going to punish you for taking away our toy by unleashing hordes of software pirates on you”
Maybe a more limited approach by the jailbreakers wouldn’t have made a difference and Sony would be over-reacting the same way, but maybe it would have. We’ll never know, but it’s something to think about.
While at the beginning it may have been about “getting back” at Sony. Now its just about pirating shit. Anyone who says different is bullshitting you. Anyone who really needed to run OtherOS wouldn’t have upgraded their firmware, everyone else really didn’t need to run it.
God, it must be so comfortable living in such a black and white world. No unclear situations, no compromise, no middle grounds. Just us vs. them. You’re either 100% evil, or 100% good. If you’re not with us, you’re against us. I wish my world was that simple.
Then again, if my world was indeed that simple, 99% of my brain would be wasted on me.
Edited 2010-09-27 18:24 UTC
Look who’s talking mister VLC text issues is Apple’s fault. How about you research before you post your corny articles.
Not directly related to the article (except maybe the last bit about sales), but here’s what I’ve noticed;
I live in Singapore, where the Xbox360 outsells the PS3 (the Wii still outsells em both, I think)
First, what kind of user I am;
I don’t game as much as I used to. I’ve owned my PS3 for close to 3 years now and the only games I own are Grand Theft Auto, Little Big Planet and Modern Warfare. These 3 are actually ‘stop-gaps’ and the only reason I ever bought a PS3 was because of Gran Turismo (which, as you all know, has been delayed multiple times)… I currently watch more movies on the PS3 than play games. My system is still ‘unhacked’ btw… didn’t even attempt installing Yellow Dog or Fedora on it, despite me being a Linux user when it comes to daily computing.
Now, regarding sales;
Where I live, the anti-piracy laws are pretty strong, but you can still buy a ‘jailbreaked/hacked’ Xbox360 if you know where to look. I know for a fact that many 360 gamers here cross the border into Malaysia where they can get pirated copies of games that work on their hacked 360 for as little as $4US (I don’t own a 360, so I have no idea whether these are actual optical discs or files they can put in the HD). The same goes for the Nintendo Wii as well.
From what I’ve noticed, piracy actually boosts console sales in many Asian nations. The reason the PS2 sold so many copies over here was because it got ‘hacked’ very early on in it’s life, compared to the Gamecube and Xbox, and the same could be said for the PS1 against it’s competitors like the Sega Saturn.
When you’re an adult with a job, you don’t really play that much and buying a few original copies of titles for your unhacked console isn’t that much of a burden, but a highschool/college student who plays way more games and has way less spending money would definitely go for a jailbroken system, 10 times out of 10.
I’m just wondering if the manufacturers realize this? Sure, Sony might not have profited much in this region from game sales of the old PS2 (since everyone bought pirated), but the sheer number of consoles they sold thanks to it being ‘pirateable’ surely made up for it, right?
Wow, I read throuogh all of your comments and the article.
All I hear ist:
Sony isn’t that bad, because…
Thom isn’t right right, because…
Microsoft is (also) bad, because…
No no no, stop that.
I have a PS3. And I am angry.
Ive bought it, some years ago. Back in that times, when Sony removed the PSOne/PS2 emulation. This is the “Peeve #1”
But for me as a linux-fan, there was the other OS Feature…. Exactly, there WAS the other OS-Feature – This ist “Peeve #2”
And now, my beloved PS2-Controller is thrown away, because i cant use it anymore with my adapter.
This is “Peeve #3”.
And hey – Just to get a new feature to the PS3, Sony has made my favourite TV-Channel Animax to a livestyle-Loser TV-Station, just in order to open it to a broader audience. Thats Number 4 in my Peeve-List.
Maybe MSFT isnt better – Who cares?
Maybe Sony added support for 3D- Bluray Movies – but just because they simple had to.
I’m really not proud of having a PS3.
I guess that my problem here is with Sony missing what people really wants
In my case I recently purchase a Sony PS3 to learn play a little bit, the only platform in which before I’ve played in The Original Nintendo (8bit). The difference is abysmal but I would like not to wait so many minutes every time I charge the GOW3 CD, I would like the option to do a backup of my games.
What about the speed of Sony Store?, OMG, I have a 3mbits connection at home, really fast for me, but is crap on the Sony PS3 Store, don’t know why but to download a demo from there is an eternity.
Sony sell the PS3 (well the CELL architecture) as a supercomputer so why remove the Other OS option instead of Fix the problem?.
Sony should give options to the users not remove it, I hope Sony do something different and help the users.
These are some numbers I posted to Slashdot:
PS3 installed base: 39.1 million.
PlayStation Network accounts: 50 million.
PlayStaton Home (avatar based social networking:) 14 million accounts. (stats from the Wikipedia)
MOVE PS3 Bundles, Starter Sets and controllers: #7, #9, #10, #22, and #38, Video Game Bestsellers, Amazon.com. (Updated Hourly)
The video game console is a social experience.
It is shared with your wife and kids.
It is connected to the 60″ Samsung HDTV in your family room – and when the next Pixar hit reaches the Blu-Ray shelf at WalMart, the firmware upgrade gets voted in and the OtherOS gets voted out.
As long as I can plug my Logitech DPF and play GranTurismo I don’t care if it also cooks breakfast or not.
I do not consider it as a multi-purpose device (like a PC) so as long as it can still play games (THAT is what the device is for, is it not?) I’m happy as a clam and if it helps keep pirates away from the platform they can take the stupid photo-browser-movie-editor and whatnot.
If I wanted a HTPC or a linux machine i’d build a proper one.
As much as I like Sony products in general and PS3 especially, I’m getting tired of morons in charge of PS3 software.
– The online store interface is even worse than iTunes.
– You can’t get to the online store to buy stuff unless you spend a hour almost every month to install an update that removes features and has a good chance of breaking your console (in which case Sony takes no responsibility what so ever).
I am over the comments that all Non-Sony USB devices are disabled with 3.50 firmware. This is blatantly wrong as I have 3.50 and my external HD works just fine as I backed up my PS3 HD the other day after the update.
As to removing functions well I was not impressed about the removal of OtherOS but it was shackled in all reality as there was no real direct access to the hardware. Is it a loss yes would it have stopped me buying a PS3, definitely not!!
The PS3 is a great console and fits into the entertainment area of our house beautifully. It plays our DVD/Blueray discs, plays games, acts as a DLNA server, works with other open source Media servers. To us it is a media hub and games console, it fulfils everything we ask of it very well.
I have noticed many knockers of the PSN well personally I think it is just fine. Can it be improved probably, is it perfect, definitely not. Is anything perfect though?
My attitude is if you don’t like it then don’t buy it!
I see where there’s criticism of Sony’s methods and practices… but where’s the screaming, burning defeat at the hands of jailbreakers and homebrewers? Where are these really great hacks and alternate games and stuff that Sony just can’t stop no matter what they do? In the end the story is headlined roughly “Sony crumbles under force of jailbreak innovators” yet reads like, “Stubborn Sony has to settle for third place in the multi-billion dollar(kroner, pound, euro, yen, whateva) console gaming market.” Color me unsympathetic to Sony’s choice to make millions, but less millions than others.
PS. In-game chat is usually the realm of the potty-mouthed obnoxionics, so I don’t miss it (much).
PS2. I have to admit I’m a PS3 owner and really wished they would have given the Linux thing a better go.
PS3. I have a computer right next to my PS3 that runs Ubuntu through an HDMI cable to my 46 inch LCD, so I don’t even use the PS3 except to play Battlefield 1943 (well worth the price of admission, I must say).
Why even bother? geee, people are so weird. Just don’t use their stuff. It sucks anyway – mostly because of these stupid and childish locks. The hell with Sony and their products – they are not even worth their price.
The PS3 had a real disadvantage compared to the Wii, xbox360 in the emergent country as the other 2 devices were very hackable for piracy. Piracy/Homebrew is one thing that helps moving hardware (I know piracy is bad, and is theft, so I’m not encouraging it).
On another hand the PS3 was starting with a boatload of features, and went bad with buggy update and important feature removal ( ps2 emulation, other OS ) that really make them look bad in the power users (that is probably the core of their hardcore gamer community ).
The xbox360 looks bad at the start of its life (well very, with the red ring and all ) and still suffering much from it.
I’m sick of the Sony hate.
I agree that Sony shouldn’t have removed the Other OS feature, but it’s no reason to single them out every time they try to block out the pirates.
FACT: Every other console EVER has had security features to prevent homebrew and unauthorised accessories and games (and piracy)
FACT: Modern consoles do firmware updates all the time for no other reason but to fix security flaws that have been exploited to allow homebrew and piracy. They ALL do this.
FACT: Modern consoles do firmware updates all the time just to block out unauthorized accessories.
FACT: The PS3 gets updates that add functionality. I don’t care about cross-game chat, but I *do* like being able to edit video on my PS3, and I *do* like the fact that my PS3 is 3D-ready. Conveniently, OSnews forgets to report on those two new features.
Sony’s Australian music store, Bandit.fm, is DRM-free and works inside any Flash-enabled web browser on any platform. The Sony Walkmans also don’t require any proprietary client software – drag and drop on all platforms. Conveniently, OSnews forgets to mention this stuff either.
Some slightly more even reporting would be appreciated. If you’re going to criticise Sony for its efforts to lock out homebrew developers, then go ahead (I don’t think homebrew should be discouraged), but don’t single out Sony for doing exactly what every other console manufacturer does.
>FACT: Every other console EVER has had security features to prevent homebrew and unauthorised accessories and games (and piracy)
This is nonsense and you know it. Eg. the Emerson Arcadia 2001 never had any such “security features”.