US PSP updated to Firmware 2.7
Japan Chronicles have applied the PSP Firmware 2.7 update (Japan only) to their US model PSP without any problems.
While doing this is not recommended, and should be avoided if you use homebrew in any shape or form on your PSP, its good to see someone takling the plunge and committing a PSP to this latest firmware version.
The main addition to the PSP’s capabilities with this firmware release is Macromedia Flash support. This has to be activated and requires that you can connect your PSP to the internet.
The Japan Chronicles site, with their updated PSP running firmware 2.7 tried out the Flash support by browsing to sites using Flash.
First stop was the Macromedia homepage. This site diodn’t work at all (ie animate), not all that unexpected as the Macromedia site will be using the latest technology and therefore would not be compatable with the Flash engine (based around version 6 of the Flash player) used for the PSP.
There was then an attempt to play a Flash game, which loaded but ran so slowly (and required keyboard input) that it was unplayable.
So a disappointing start to the Macromedia Flash support for the Sony PSP. Of course at this moment in time, there are no Flash based sites developed explicitly for the PSP, I’m sure as the firmware is rolled out across all countries and people begin to upgrade (especially once homebrew is working on it), we will start to see dedicated Flash sites for the PSP, designed to make the most of the available control interface and the animation options for the PSP Flash version.
The upgrade to 2.7 is now available in the UK. I was able to upgrade this morning and will try out some flash sites this evening.
Mike, please report back if you have any great success with viewing flash based sites using your PSP.
I’m interested to hear your views on how well it works.
I assume you are not a homebrew fan, so were not concerned about losing the ability to use the eLoader etc?
Flash
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Spent a leisurely evening trying out some Flash based games. The main issue that I have come across is that only the smallest Flash files load sucessfully. By small, the largest file I managed to load was about 80K but other elements on the screen may also take up memory so larger files may be able to load sucessfully. Anything above 200K definitely causes an Out of Memory error.
The flash files that loaded ran smoothly – I did not notice any issues with speed (hardly suprising given the small file size). Obviously, any games that rely on keyboard input (spacebar to jump, etc) cannot be used. Games that used only the cursor keys did work using the corresponding cursor keys on the PSP (but not the analog thumb control).
Some games had a screen size that meant you could not effectively play the game.
Sound seemed to play correctly.
If flash games are going to be developed for the PSP it seems to me that the following issues are relevant:
1. What is the maximum file size that can be handled using the internal memory (and can you use memory on the Memory Stick other than to store the webpage that is loaded into the web browser – I suspect not). Whether Sony will release this information or not, I don’t know.
2. Watch the screen size.
3. Given that the web browser on the PSP hogs use of the keys, Square to move pages or tabs, etc, the key options for games will be limited unless the flash player has priority use of the keys to override the web browser’s use of those keys.
4. Sony’s upgrade notes suggest that not all of the Flash 6 features are implemented. Again, will Sony reveal what can and cannot be done with the flash player on the PSP?
Other points
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I tried saving an RSS file. This worked fine.
I’m not sure whether this is a new feature or something that I have not spotted before, but when a webpage is loading, if you hold down the Square key, the coloured bar at the top now shows the progress for loading that page and which TAB it is loading into (for example the red bar turned pink and progressively turned red as the page loaded). This may be something that has always been there but I have been to busy to notice!
I want also to check whether the web browser has been updated to allow better manipulation of the DOM from Javascript to allow dynamic updates of webpages.
Thanks for the great write up Mike, very helpful.
I agree with you that getting some detailed specs from Sony regarding the exact capabilities of the Flash player would be of huge benefit to the community, but I somehow get the feeling that the details are not going to be forthcoming.
As for the changes to the loading bar (Square key), I’ve just checked out my PSP running 2.6 firmware and there appears to be progress bar overlay on the tab graphic, ie the yellow tab loading the BBC website had a darker yellow element which overlay the standard yellow tab, showing progress until the loading was complete. So not a new feature
I’ll be interested to hear if there have been any other changes to the PSP’s browser functionality, as the last time I tried to create a site specifically for the PSP I encountered a number of issues with the javascript implementation.
Cheers
Dave
Does the Flash player run standalone, or only via the web browser?
Hi Mike
Could you possibly try these out for us
http://www.pixelsumo.com/lab/psp-flash/
Thanks
Chris,
My understanding is that the Flash player is a plug-in to the web browser and therefore will only run Flash files within a web page. Theoretically, it should be possible to take a swf file and provide an HTML wrapper that enables it to be opened in a web browser.
Chris,
I have done some intial test loading the swf files in the browser but not saving them to the memory stick.
The files all run in full screen mode.
The file to test the mouse position works but the file to test mouse hiding does not. The mouse remains visible.
The file to test the D pad works. The block moves but the movement was a little jerky.
The file to test keyboard codes did not work. The keys did not register and still performed their usual browser functions.