I kinda got locked into this post title [because I'm lazy] when I noticed that there was a new version of Wordpress available. So I upgraded...and now I'm stuck with this title. Because I'd rather waste all these characters complaining about it than, y'know, click a few times and come up with a new title.

Anyway....

So, sometime last month, I ordered a bunch of stuff from DealExtreme. Again. Because my DS Lite's hinge broke, and the touch screen hasn't been calibrateable in...over a year now. And, while I was there, I decided to get a few other things that would let me do the sorts of things I've always wanted to do with my handhelds....

Which is why I've had sorta-success. See, I haven't actually gotten 'round to doing all the stuff I need to do to my DS yet, but I have been playing, uh, homebrew [yeah, that's it, homebrew] games on it with much more ease than I used to. Because I've got a different flashcart now.

I was doing that last night. And, encouraged by that little success, I installed custom firmware on my PSP this morning. Really way easier than it sounds, if you're smart enough to order a Pandora battery before getting yourself into a potential mess.

Also, I recommend a great deal of reading up on the subject, not just so you know what you're doing, but so you know which tutorial was written by a blithering fucking idiot and which one was written by someone who not only knows what they're doing, but can communicate it in a way that makes sense. Lots of the former, not many of the latter.

...then I installed custom firmware on Gremlin's PSP.

Custom firmware is nice. Now I can watch movies without having to convert them into that obnoxious string of letters and numbers -- that iPod video format works just fine! And I can play ROMs. And read pdfs. And stuff!

...when I'm done experimenting, I'll probably start 'training' for actually fixing my DS, since that really, really needs to be done.

It's one of the newer ones, obviously. Not new as in actually new, but new as in a 2000 and not an original.

It had to go in to be fixed [which the store paid for], so I was kinda without it for two weeks after I got it. But it's good as new now.

Better, because I just replaced the faceplate. For under six bucks. All by myself. Because the screen was scratched, and they were quoting me prices that'd cover a whole new PSP.

The hard part was getting out the screw that their tech stripped. That was annoying.

The new faceplate is black, by the way. And yes, I ordered it from dealextreme.com -- less than a week ago, actually. I didn't pay extra for shipping, either.

Both faceplates.

And the PSP, taken apart. Ish. Not completely, although I did do that two days ago, just to prove to myself that I could do it and get it back together again properly.

I forgot, the other hard part was keeping the screen clean while I was putting it back together. Because, you see, that internal screen is a hair magnet, and I own a cat.

But, I managed.

And it still works. So, yay.

I think it looks nice this way, with the white buttons and the black. And now it's very much mine. Unique and special...just like all the other people who've done this.

The headphone jack was all fucked. And, since it wasn't our fault, we don't have to pay for it to be fixed.

Isn't it amazing how you can not have something and get along without it, but the instant you have it, it becomes an important part of your life, and being without it doesn't feel the same as it did before you had it?