I’ve been waiting for a stable version 5.00 from team M33 and I think they’ve released one already. There’s this 5.00 M33-3 and because it is the firmware version 5.00, a couple of changes are made but only few made it to the PSP-2000 version.
THE NEW XMB WAVE
One of the noticeablt changes was the XMB wave. Instead of having the common two pair-waves, you now have a single pair of wave. The lower part of the waves are brighter than the part above. What’s more, you have the option to switch back to the classic wave from previous versions.
They also added few more colors since the effect of the new wave is quite spectacular. There’s even a new visualization in MUSIC that has the same wave but goes up as the music goes louder. It also darkens as you play the music so when you play your music with that visualization, you will be able to notice which is the real XMB wave and which one is the visualization.
SLEEP TIMER FOR MUSIC
Another feature offered by this firmware was the sleep timer option for the MUSIC. It is probably for people who always forget to turn off the player everytime they listen to music. I, as an example, always leave my PSP playing Jazz music every night. The thing is, I fall asleep without turning my PSP off so good thing this feature was released. Now I can set the PSP to turn off after 30 minutes or an hour. The sleep timer can be set in 30 minutes interval. 😀
NEW ICONS AND SMALL FEATURES
if you noticed, it’s not the NETWORK icon that is on the right-most part of the X-menu but PLAYSTATION NETWORK instead. This feature lets PSP users to access the network as well as the store of Playstation to download and purchase new and old PSP goodies. I had one attempt before to enter but I still don’t know of it’s my firmware version (m33-3) of it’s just the Wifi that’s rubbish that I cannot connect.
One small feature was also introduced and this is the USB Auto-connect. This prevents you from scrolling to Settings just to connect your PSP on your computer via USB. Now, you can plug your PSP and the system will immediately connect your PSP to your computer. Of course, like most features like this, it can be disabled.
QWERTY…
Yup, this QWERTY keyboard layout is also offered in 5.00. You can now type words on the OSK by pressing Select to change the layout. It’s easier for me to type words now unlike the previous layout but the previous layout is still the default one and you have to press Select to move to this layout. The layout works pretty much like a typical computer keyboard. If you press “SHIFT”, you’ll end up with this one:
Just like when you hold SHIFT in a typical keyboard. Pretty nice, isn’t it?
UNAVAILABLE FEATURES
There are some features that are not offered or not visible in the PSP-2000 series, probably because it will be introduced in the PSP-3000 series. Such features were the TITLE DISPLAY feature which gives you an option to disable the Title screen from showing up when you start your PSP. The Backlight auto-adjust is probably for the PSP-3000’s new screen. Nevertheless, these features doesn’t seem to give players a big problem. For me, I don’t need those.
VERDICT
I think the new firmware is quite good. There are features that I liked especially the new XMB wave and the sleep timer. At least SONY is making something other people wanted the PSP to have. I wish they continue this habit. Although they are not releasing any new games yet but at least the new firmware made me happy.
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