An nameless reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Final week, electronics engineer Lorentio Brodesco introduced the completion of a mock-up for nsOne, reportedly the primary customized PlayStation 1 motherboard created outdoors of Sony within the console’s 30-year historical past. The absolutely practical board accepts unique PlayStation 1 chips and matches instantly into the unique console case, marking a milestone in reverse-engineering for the traditional console launched in 1994. Brodesco’s motherboard is not an emulator or FPGA-based re-creation — it is a real circuit board designed to work with genuine PlayStation 1 parts, together with the CPU, GPU, SPU, RAM, oscillators, and voltage regulators. The board represents over a yr of reverse-engineering work that started in March 2024 when Brodesco found incomplete documentation whereas repairing a PlayStation 1.
“This is not an emulator. It is not an FPGA. It is not a contemporary reproduction,” Brodesco wrote in a Reddit put up concerning the undertaking. “It is an actual motherboard, appropriate with the unique PS1 chips.” It is a fascinating undertaking for some PS1 fanatics as a result of a customized motherboard may permit house owners of damaged consoles to revive their techniques by transplanting unique chips from broken boards onto new, practical ones. With unique PS1 motherboards turning into more and more liable to failure after three many years, substitute boards may prolong the lifespan of those traditional consoles with out resorting to emulation.
The nsOne undertaking — quick for “Not Sony’s One” — makes use of a hybrid design primarily based on the PU-23 sequence motherboards present in SCPH-900X PlayStation fashions however reintroduces the parallel port that Sony had faraway from later revisions. Brodesco upgraded the unique two-layer PCB design to a four-layer board whereas sustaining the identical type issue. […] As Brodesco famous on Kickstarter, his undertaking’s aim is to “create complete documentation, design recordsdata, and production-ready blueprints for manufacturing absolutely practical motherboards.” Past repairs, the documentation and design recordsdata Brodesco is creating would protect the PlayStation 1’s {hardware} structure for future generations: “It is a tribute to the PS1, to retro {hardware}, and to the idea that one particular person actually can construct the inconceivable.”
