Dead PSP battery, worth salvaging?

When I got my PSP a while back, it had a dead battery. I've tried a few times since I got new battery and it still won't charge. The battery info in PSP shows 0% all the time and I've cracked it open. The battery measues 1.8v and that's after leaving it plugged in overnight. I am pretty sure the original battery is dead. It is the official Sony one and probably the original one that came with my PSP.

Is it worth salvaging the rest? Maybe find a suitable sized 3.6/3.7v lipo and solder it in? I assume it is lipo? And where is a safe place to get one? I'll assume all those on eBay claiming to be 10,000 mAh are shit and not worth the time.

 

Worth keeping if you ever need to unbrick... Depends which battery this is..

 

The battery might not be dead. I had one that wouldn't charge up, but I read online that sometimes PSP batteries get locked and won't charge up. When this happens, the PSP battery does have a little charge in it, but it can't dissipate the charge through the PSP, and the PSP can't charge it up. To test it, connect the battery to a small bulb, and if the bulb lights up, or blows since the PSP's output is too strong for the bulb, then you know that the battery is not dead, just locked.

To unlock it, you just have to dissipate all of the battery's power. I did this by buying a cheap buzzer from Maplins, and connected it to the battery, and left the buzzer buzzing. After a while, when the buzzing had stopped and I'd left it longer to get rid of any extra charge, I put the (now empty) battery in my PSP, charged up, and the battery has worked ever since.

Apparently (so I read, don't quote me on it) the problem is due to Sony trying to stop companies from copying the PSP's battery. The battery contains anti-piracy hardware, and when it misfires, it locks the battery, and the only way to fix it is to completely drain the battery. I can't remember what article I read about all this in, but google for it. A quick google found this:


http://www.gamespot.com/forums/playstation-nation-1000002/psp-battery-problem-fix-27034395/



And google found another possible solution:

http://www.dcemu.co.uk/vbulletin/threads/183737-how-to-fix-a-DEAD-battery

Hopefully one of these methods will fix your battery.

 

I'll try draining it dead.

 

That's absurd. What's there to copy?!
Li-on batteries are "smart" because they need a computer to monitor their charging progress, in order to be charged correctly and safely. When they are dead, then the computer acts as a fail-safe to prevent them from reaching the point where they blow up.

What this seems to be, is an act of trying to re-calibrate the battery. But even if he does so, I wouldn't expect the battery to be in a very good shape (compared to when new), given how old it probably already is.

I don't remember this clearly, but I think that the low level for a li-on cell shouldn't be even that low. If the voltage is that low, it's likely dead... but anyway, he has nothing to lose by trying to revive an otherwise dead battery.
I found this article on what the problem might be: http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/low_voltage_cut_off

Until today, I have failed to find a _good_ SONY original battery for my fat PSP, so I went with compatibles. They last _roughly_ as long as the original (ignoring the false promises of a better capacity), and are cheaper and newer (aren't expired).
Yea, its likely because the PSP is dead at where I live, so the only new SONY batteries that I find are about 4 years old (expired/old stock).

He should use a light bulb or something that has some resistance; don't short-circuit the battery, it might lead to an explosion.

 

Might seem absurd but the PSP wants to work with an official battery pack. I tried a 3rd party one years ago, voltages were fine, installed fine, but PSP refused to boot.

Good idea with draining the one you have and then trying to recharge. Usually when a Li-po cell fails it tends to expand in size - if they do, throw the cells away as the lithium is compromised and if you recharge the cells, the batteries could literally explode in flames.

If the cells aren't swollen, and there is a voltage, it would seem logical to be the mini PCB board in the battery pack that is in lock-out mode. Usually, charging for about 20 seconds can reset the PCB and allow normal voltage output levels again however if there is another factor preventing this recharge/reset, like some kind of anti-piracy lockout, then that still won't work.

Definitely don't short circuit the battery pack or you'll explode the Li-po cells.

Yes, most Chinese batteries are fake in their claims for amperage; there is no way a PSP cell can be 10amps - probably more like 1 or 2 amps. I think the one in my old PSP is 1.5 amps.

There are loads of videos on YouTube about exploding Li-po cells; whether you overcharge them (by making the PCB fail first), cut in half, pierce them, etc. Result is similar, loads of toxic fumes and explosions. Here is one found with a quick search:

 

That or the protection inside the psp has engaged and won't charge anymore.

 

No, it will work with 3rd party batteries. I've been doing that for years and the only special thing that is known about the PSP battery, is that a serial number of 0xFFFFFFFF will cause the earlier consoles to boot into service mode.

It seems more likely that yours was crap. Why would someone make a 3rd party battery that totally does not work?

 

May well have been crap, a lot of Chinese batteries are unfortunately.

 

I have no idea, I was just saying what I read, I didn't claim it as fact in any way. I don't even know why draining my battery made it capable of being charged up again, it just worked for me this time, which doesn't mean it would work again even with the same battery and PSP, let alone for Wilykat (but I hope it does).

 

Still waiting. I slapped a few LEDs, the RGB flashing LED commonly used for parties and rave trinkets. Draws about 100mA total and it's still going bright after about 24 hours. For a battery that only puts out about 1.8v, it's surprisingly strong. It's probably salvageable.

Too bad my PSP is 085v2, one of the first PSP that cannot make Pandora battery

 

Probably because it recalibrated the battery.

All the best to you with achieving that! Just remember to supervise it, in case it blows up.

I think that it's not really a loss, unless you love playing around with the firmwares or stuff that deals with the flash storage. If you install a good one and leave it alone, you won't ever get a brick.

 

Yeah I'm fine with running a little program every time my PSP complete shuts off to restore the CFW support.

 

Fuel gauge. When the battery is charging it communicates with the PSP syscon and updates the charge level on both sides. It's programmed to only update the fuel gauge when it can talk to the syscon (it's made that way on purpose so it can only be properly charged using the PSP or a SONY made charger). It's SONY we're talking about here. lol

And yes, SONY tried to block pirate batteries from working, *several times*. The way they finally managed to completely block them out was on PSP 3000 they hashed the communication between the syscon and the battery MCU. That defeated both the pandora battery trick (a real jigkick battery for these PSPs have a challenge/response protocol instead of simply having battery serial be all bits 0 or 1...) and bootleg batteries.

 

Could you please elaborate on their several attempts here? Never heard of that before.

But if that's the case, then won't this mean that older SONY batteries aren't compatible with the PSP-3000 series?
I have a PSP-3005, but never used a compatible battery in it because the console and battery were the newest, and is hence it's the set in the best shape amongst all the consoles that I have.

 

The first attempt was made when they upgraded syscon from "fat" (1000) to bright/lite (2000). The first bunch of fake batteries stopped working there. I happen to have one of that kind somewhere here. It used a NEC MCU similar to the one SONY used on the official battery.

The way they blocked fake batteries the first time probably has to do with the fake ones not having a eeprom.

Second time defeated newer fake batteries when they upgraded to 3000 series.

Original batteries will work on any PSP. Fake batteries don't do the "communication through the 1-wire bus" job properly and SONY took advantage of that to make them stop working.

Edit: A lot of laptop batteries store their operational data in RAM so disconnecting the wires from the cells to the circuit board cause the operational data to be lost.

Fortunately that isn't the case with the PSP battery. But that may cause the fuel gauge to go nuts. Which require you to fully discharge it with a electric motor or lamp then charge it using the PSP.

 

Wouldn't it just be a coincidence that the SYSCON change broke compatibility with the crappy products, given that their original batteries still worked and they never had to improve security in them?
After all, you know how the clone stuff are like. I have a clone SATA adaptor that causes my SCPH-39006 to malfunction so badly, but yet I think that it works fine on other consoles because I seem to be the only one on this planet complaining about it.

Yea, that's what I'm wondering. We all know that they tightened security around the service mode, but I don't remember hearing anything about the enhanced security affecting the normal operation of the console (in terms of battery support).
Since the older batteries were designed and manufactured before the PSP-3000 was designed and manufactured, there's no way that they would support the new security measures (specifically, the hashing that you mentioned) that it has.

 

If you force to to connect a 2k/3k battery to a PSP-1000 you will see it doesn't work even if the three contacts make proper connection. The newer batteries (for slim) use a different communication protocol. The newer PSP units accept the older batteries for sake of backwards compatibility but the opposite is not true.

 

So when was that done? With the 2K or the 3K? Or are you referring to the same change between the 1K and 2K series?

But surely this would mean that if the clone battery was designed properly, it would still work on all of the models?

 

When they changed the battery for the 2k units, they got rid of fake 1k batteries. A while later fake 2k batteries started to pop around, which is what they got rid of with the 3k series. I don't know the details on how they pulled the stunt.

Must be something like how they banned fake PS3 controllers in the 3.40 update. A couple years later they did it again.

Likewise, Microsoft commented at some point they had a lot of "hidden security features" on their devices. Their main target with that comment was counterfeit XBOX360 accessories.

Undoubtedly SONY also have embedded dormant features or characteristics on their devices, which they can probe on any of them, obscure enough to allow for authenticity checking without bootleggers notice they're there...