What you will need

A PS2
An old Credit-Card / Store loyalty card / Phonecard etc
A sharp knife
A PS2 game "Backup"
Action Replay v2+/Gameshark or DVD Region X (AR/GS recommended)

What do I do with all that?

Firstly take your credit card (etc.) and the knife and cut it to this shape:


The next step is to remove the facia from your PS2's DVD rom, it's not 100% necessary, but it makes life a lot easier and you can always put it back on later.
Eject the DVD tray and gently unclip the front of the cd tray face,being careful not to break the pins holding it to the rest of the tray.

The Swap Trick
put the tool into the DVD drive under the tray with the "hook" pointing into the console (I.E like the diagram above)
Look under the drive tray and you will see a white "pin", insert the slidecard so that the "U" shaped hook hooks onto the pin and slide it to the left until it will slide no more
the DVD tray is now "unlocked" and should be able to be pulled out manually
Put the backup in the tray and push the tray closed
slide the card back to the right so that it locks the tray again.

How to boot the backup

Depending on what type of disk you're trying to boot changes the instructions for this next section somewhat.

Booting a PS2 CD-Rip - Works with DVD Region X and Action Replay/GameShark

Boot AR2/GS2 disc 1
Select START GAME > WITHOUT CODES
But do not push eject as prompted
do the swap trick as above
Press "X" on the controller

With DVD RegionX just load it up, do the swap trick then press start (NOT the X button, it MUST be START)

Booting a PS2 DVD backup - Action Replay/Gameshark only
Boot AR2/GS2 disc 1.
At the main screen press the EJECT button to eject the CD tray.
Replace the AR2/GS2 disc with an original PS2 DVD game, such as Grand Theft Auto. (the bigger the better, GTA has the biggest single layer TOC @ 4.7Gb used)
Close the CD tray (press EJECT again) and wait for about 30 seconds.
Select START GAME and then select WITHOUT CODES
But do not push eject as prompted
do the swap trick as above
and press X now to start the game.

Booting a PS1 game - Works with Action Replay/GameShark ONLY

Boot AR2/GS2 disc 2
Select START GAME > WITHOUT CODES
But do not push eject as prompted
do the swap trick as above
Press "X" on the controller

This was done from memory and the swap trick part may not be 100%. I'll check it when I get home and post corrections if needed

Sticky!

Thank you very much PCA - awesome

NP, as stated in the original post though, it's pretty much all from memory, so if anyone spots any mistakes, please PM me (so as to keep the thread clean)

the pic is kind of odd
I mean you have a square shaped area there which measures 1/2" x 1" ...??
and how do I know which way the card should be in the first place so I know which way to cut it?

an idea; make dashed lines in the pic for the shape of the complete untouched credit card/whatever.

Obviously the picture isn't to scale, that's why the 1 x 1/2" area is square, not rectangular.

If you want to know which way to cut the card up, just draw a template to scale on paper and then lay it over the card to be cut up. It's hardly rocket science.

It would be difficult to do to scale (unless I do a pdf) as it would depend what resolution you were running in.

Here's one to scale, not necessarily to size:

yeah, got size and scale confused

Will this version of AR do the job?

http://www.play.com/play247.asp?page=ti ... tle=180487

Also, from the same page:





Failing that, is AR/Gameshark available to download or is it one of those non-copiable discs like the 'boot' disc?

ALL PS2 .iso's are non bootable in a non modded PS2 unfortunately

That AR should be OK, although considering the difference in price the swapmagic3 might be a safer bet : http://www.gizmo-guru.com/consoles/ps2_mod_chip.htm

Nice PC_A....thanks for this...will be doing this to mine...already grabbed swapmagic 3

NP, glad to help

sorry, but I cannot recommend this method, the slidecard-method ruins your tray in a very short time.

Then you have to pay for the repair, that money is better invested in a chip, at the moment the Matrix Infinity is the best choice.

You don't have to use that slidecard and swapdisc or Action Replay.

With Modchip inside every game is selfbooting without swap.

Think about....it gives your beloved PS2 a longer life!!!


Greetings


Germaniac

I've been doing this for 3 years now and my PS2 and tray are fine, mind you I'm not ham fisted

For the amount of use my PS2 get nowadays, I'm not spending a damn penny on it.

Not too mention some dodgy issues with chipping a console over here in the UK. Ppl have been prosecuted I believe.

I have to agree with this guy. I've tried the slidecard trick.It can royally screw up you're tray. I had my PS2 modded at the local Asian mall, instead. Infinity chip. It's a month later and no problems. Boots up the DVD-Rs well. I use DVDdecrypter to backup in ISO mode. In my opinion, go with the mod chip. It's the best way, If not the cheapest.

Has anyone here tried Swap Magic / Magic Switch? Please share your experiences!

I have, works beautifully.
The only game I couldn't get to boot (ICO) booted using dvd-Region X other than that it's been flawless

thanks for the info i just payed a guy in SD to mod my xbox and ps2