The Lost PlayStation Console Add-On! - Gaming History Secrets 

I only ever used that port for the original GameShark. Which was a great upgrade to the idea of the game genie

My first experience with a playstation was when you find your first zombie in the original Resident Evil. Pretty sure it scarred me for life lol 😆

I have used the parallel port for my plug and play. Playing pirated copies, plain region locked games, and even the cheats were very awesome. The biggest issue was that as you open the disk tray to put in the pirated CD, you had to find a way to close the disc tray to enable the reader. If you close it by itself, it would not read the disk. So often times, we would have to use a toothpick to press the button in the back, so that the disk reader can start reading the pirated disk. I’m pretty sure a few of us in the chat have had to do that in order to play pirated games or pirated copies.

Lady Decade, have you ever heard of the PlayStation Type-C? It was mentioned in, I believe, EGM during the development cycle of Tekken 3 as an updated PSX that had more RAM and a faster CPU. I wanted that thing to come out sooooooo badly!

A dial-up modem or RAM expansion cart are the two most likely candidates from an internal development perspective, especially given that Sega had both for the Saturn from almost the get-go. Odds are Sony sat tight and waited to see the market data from Sega's various efforts to make final judgement calls on the necessary overhead versus return on investment. It was probably the smart move to skip on the modem at the time, but a RAM cart would've been absolutely phenomenal to have.

It's a shame I never had the original Sony PlayStation. Since I got into modding, it's something I would like to do. That console was definitely a "necessity for gracious living"

To me it’s the cheat cartridge slot lol

I had a blast using my game shark on that port to do things in FF VII, like bring Aeris back to life

From what I remembered, that port was intended for additional peripheral support. In short, add on's for future tech intended for the PSX. Saturn would similarly have this with the 4 Meg cart inserted in the back where its memory card would go. Sadly, nothing could push the PSX like that add on, yet the Action Play/ Game Sharks did help play import games. I abuse it to this day.

I had that exact model of the VCD player on my PS1. When my internal modchip started to fail it could be used to play backups too. Amazingly versatile device.

I had a friend that told me about a mod device (Game Hunter) that plugged into the parallel I/O port and got one then. It was like the year 2001 and was real cheap that allowed to play back up discs, Game Shark codes and watch FMV and music files off a game disc including a burned game. I still have it today and still has codes I entered in 2001. Buddy had a CD burner then and made me burned games as long as I let him copy all my collection. A CD burner was EXPENSIVE so it was a blessing having a friend that was into computers. I loved renting games and not playing the original with only making a copy and returning. Racked up a lot of games, fun times!

That’s where I plug in my gameshark in, hasn’t been unused since I got my gameshark 😂

Rad video. Your doing a good job finding fresh topics other you tubers don’t discuss.

I used to be a freelance writer for certain Official Sony magazines back in the day, and the Parallel Port was indeed used by devs for things like debugging. I personally never saw any of the devices used (being freelance I worked from home). There were the occasional pices of alpha and beta code that needed a dongle in the form of a memory card to run. I wonder if the weird naming of the port as a parallel port had anything to do with the leftover days of earlier computing where it was mostly parallel processing.

The parallel port should’ve been used for a ram expansion unit just like the Sega Saturn and the Nintendo 64.

What if that port was a leftover from the SNES colab that sony did with nintendo?

I used to plug in my GameShark in the parallel port

My guess is the Parallel I/O port was much like the hidden port on the NES. Sony was probably just thinking ahead. In case they ever did decide to release some type of add on for the console, they'd have a port to connect it to, but then later decided they weren't gonna use it so the later PS1s had it removed. Whether or not Sony ever made an add-on that used the Parallel I/O port or planned to make one that used it is anyone's guess.

the first progamme i watched with you talking about that "Saturn want all rubbish really... still i think I have figured out that PlayStation in truth seems to be an all time fave for you AM I RIGHT? I have a gut feeling

"What's this for?" ...My Gameshark to plug in, silly!

I remember getting that in 1995 I think, I had Tekken, Die Hard trilogy, and Destruction Derby. To begin with.

I used that slot to plug in my Gameshark device!

@ 1:49 that port was the slot that the GAMESHARK originally went into

I used the slot for GameShark and importing games.

Parallel port works with original game shark or codebreaker. I had one.

I bought a gameshark in like '98 or '99. Good times.

I used the parallel port for my GameShark. Never had to remove it and could be turned off with a switch. Still use it today!

Lmao, the good old Game Shark port! And when the PSone model rolled out, Code Sharks worked with a disc and memory card, you swapped out the disc with a game disc after you picked your cheats to play with.

What a dirty old slot, taken it from multiple hardwares

you mean the gameshark port? wtf is the serial port for though????

I remember having a GameShark and plugging it in the parallel port. Other than that, I've never used it for anything else. Figured Sony would release something that would make use of it. It would've been nice if they made RAM carts similar to Sega Saturn, or graphic boosters.

consoles have their motherboards and their equivalents to pcie slots for cards.

I had a clone of the Super GB Booster that seemed to be a crappy emulator soc. The worst part is it just repeatedly played a 25 second clip of some crappy tracked chiptune. I always figured the port was for a modem.

I always used it for my Gameshark, I was kind of hoping there was going to be a megabyte upgrade for like X-Men versus Street Fighter when it came out but, only for the Saturn. And that's why I bought my Sega Saturn LOL

To be actually exact, the PSIO is more of a flashcart like an everdrive than a development tool, even if you can put your own games in an SD card. It's clunky because every time you need to test your game you have to copy the game onto the SD card. And also, the PSIO (as I know) does not feature any debugging capabilities. But the Xplorer FX, the cheat cartridge, can be actually used as a proper development tool. You need a chipped PS1, or a way to play burned CD-Rs, to be able to run the flashing program for the Xplorer FX. Once flashed, the Xplorer FX can be used as many things : an action replay cheat device, a VRAM viewer, kind of a memory card manager and of course, a development tool. You use it with an old PC with a parallel port (the big VGA looking printer port) and you can transfer your game and play it directly on the playstation without needing to either copy it again and again onto an SD card, or burning CD-Rs (that would be a waste). That was the precision comment of a PS1 homebrew developper !

You forgot another device that uses the port. VMem Virtual Memory Card System for PS1 can be use and its gives you 60 virtual memory cards for your games to use. I have couple of these and they work really good. You can turn on or off the real memory card slots and use the virtual memory slots instead. You can copy back n forth from both card system.

I used the parallel port to connect an MP3 player that had a built in Action replay. I had an Amiga at the time with an 040 accelerator that was too under powered for playing MP3's at full stereo quality so i would use the Playstation with MP3 player to listen to music.

Discovering yet even more cancelled/unreleased hardware add ons are the real necessities of gracious living!

I only bought PSX for their VCD and then was told it was removed from the UK version, but still charged us the prices of a version built in. Sony still do this now, ps3 fans were better in Japan.

VCD takes me back watching 007 the world is not enough on the PS1

Sony got rid of the port and covered it up because of the GameShark and people using it to by pass Copyright protection. Sony has a long history of trying to block and in general prevent the use of Cheat devices. But flatout the port was probably left installed with the first models of the Playstation because it was probably used in debugging consoles by Sony. You need to remember Sony has a reputation of not exactly having the most reliable first run Consoles. But if you noticed how the ports kept getting removed and covered up on each following model of the Playstation to cut costs on each version.

Comment for the algorithm

My dad passed down his original PlayStation 1 to me and what’s awesome about it is that it’s got that I/O port! I could play games off an SD card if I wanted to!

There is more to the Xplorer than mentioned. You can connect it to a win 9x pc and scan the ram to create cheats or even edit ram on the fly! You can also iirc grab screenshots from ut. It is a very cool tool. The slot exists imo for Sony to create a hardware expansion. They never did but 3rd parties took advantage.

1995 I got my self my first playstation. I packed up Sega CD and became a big time fan. My buddy went to Nintendo 64 and enjoying his Golden Eye! That was the only game I liked for that system. My first game was Dark Forces! Rebel assault 2 was next. Then sports games. Golf, John Madden NFL, triple play baseball and NBA basketball. Then 1996 RESIDENT EVIL! ALL my buddies loved this game. Metal gear solid. Rainbow 6 1 and Navy Seals! We played on PS live with the head mic. Playing other people over seas. And the rest is history. My PS1 died in 2002. So I picked the PS2 great system to. The DVD player had problems working. I sent it back as ND they gave me new PS2. No cost. That same year Xbox! That ruled we played that system more than the PS2. Xbox live and better graphics. But Resident Evil ruled over Xbox. We went to play RE2, 3,4, 5 and 6.

I always automatic assume parallel ports are for software/ hardware diagnostic and flashing for the developers.

Wow many things i didn't know about the psx1,nice to know,i play a bit of psx1 trough emu now days and had it in 98,medievil 1&2 were the best for me next to mgs and mgsvrm !! WOW GAMEBOY GAMES ON THE PLAYSTATION WOW

I still have a device that that uses that port that was not mentioned, it is called the V-mem from InterAct it had virtual memory cards and if I remember correctly it held about 80 memory cards worth of saves on it.

My 1st playstation I had was the OG! it had the Yellow white and red metal circles built onto the system. Was bluky, was before the dual shock was even thought of! It was a few years before the Dual Analog controller came out! Was a double stick controller that had plastic tips that grooved in instead of the outward rubber gripped sticks were all so familiar with now. There was a Green and Red setting for the ANALOG on button. I got one the same night "SF EX plus alpha" came out. We traded lots of stuff in ti be able to get the game and needed a 2nd controller and that was the unit one they had. Never knew it would be this lost piece of PS history!🤷‍♂️😯😳

I used a device plugged into the parallel port. It allowed Video CD's to play. In South Korea, porn video shops sold these.

I bought a PS game shark that connected in the port, back in the days, it came with a spring that i had to insert in the cd door mechanism, the spring was always pushing on the switch inside the door, telling the PS that the cd was always closed, so with the game shark in place I would boot the PS with an original cd, once booted I could open the door and swap a copy , close the door and play the copied game

I remember that me and my brothers used the Port Game Shark and watched Wild Wild West on VCD with this Adapter one time.

@ladydecade My nostalgia just went off the roof I mean I remember being 3 years holding the PS1 controller playing Tekken that was 95 😆.

My mom bought me it at launch, for $599ish in Canada, included a memory card seperate, plus a seperate Ridge Racer. I got it for graduating from grade 9 to grade 10. Aren't mom's awesome.

What the explansion ports true purpose was...its huge. Wait for it... The true purpose of the expansion port...was to expand. Boomshakalaka

Not lost at all, The "VCD Player Add-on" plugged into both rear ports, i had one, so did a few people i knew . ok you cover that Target had one display stand of VCD's VCD's where some what popular here in Australia

ez that slot is where the external mod chip plugs in so you can play burned games!

I now could play Game Boy on my Playstation, and Playstation on my Dreamcast, and Dreamcast on my MacBook with an Xbox One controller…

Milady, I don't think my Playstation had the parallel port. I bought mine in 1998. Great presentation.

God, the Super GB booster, it's been soo long since I've heard that name.

It has to be for either a modem add-on or perhaps a pc adapter. I don’t see why it would be for debugging since that’s what dev units are for and wouldn’t be needed for a commercial product. I am leaning heavily with online because there were consoles before that tried it as well (Sony channel, Nindendo satellite whatever, etc). Perhaps they then realized how well those turned out for their competitors and decided that it wasn’t the right time for it. That OR that they saw that software devs weren’t going to be making enough games to utilize it for it to be worthwhile to introduce.

the parallel Isis/Osiris worked for Gameshark connection

1:55 I've never seen this cover from Mario Galaxy 2. Is it a custom one or a special edition? I only know the one with the daytime background.

I'm guessing they were thinking of one and saw how Sega 32x and Sega CD flopped and decided add ons consoles weren't good until we get PlayStation vr

i have a device that hook's in the back of the PlayStation called gold finger. a friend of mine gave me this. the gold finger let's me do the swap disc trick with burn PlayStation cd's.

Now it's time to find out if my one remaining PSX has the P. Port. Lost one many moons ago that had game shark or whatnot. can not remember what it was! CDRs have long bit the dust. remember the cheapies back in the day?

Dunno, but my pro action replay connected to it, allowed me to use codes, and to play games out of my region.

Had it, used a GameShark and a Game Wizard Pro to play imports, game copies, and view the game files on discs. Friend had a disk drive for games saves instead of using memory card.

In my younger days as a financial derelict tech kept me outta trouble. I found one of these expansion carts that let you play .iso files from cd-r at a yard sale for 1 usd. At the tender age of 23 drinking up all my dollars. This find was better than sex and even mario kart too.

Sony must love unused ports. They did the same thing with the PlayStation Vita. Maybe a topic for another video ?

There's an intersting third party accessory for that port made some years ago, named PSIO, you put PSX isos on it and...

I have used the parallel port for my plug and play. Playing pirated copies, plain region locked games, and even the cheats were very awesome. The biggest issue was that as you open the disk tray to put in the pirated CD, you had to find a way to close the disc tray to enable the reader. If you close it by itself, it would not read the disk. So often times, we would have to use a toothpick to press the button in the back, so that the disk reader can start reading the pirated disk. I’m pretty sure a few of us in the chat have had to do that in order to play pirated games or pirated copies.

I have a second-model PS1 with the parallel port. Only ever used it for a GameShark.

The slot existed for only cheating devices change my mind 🤣

Very nice video. Thanks. Love your curly hair. 😍

1:20 ... Pelo visto tinha que estuprar literalmente o Nintendinho..kkkkkk Tadinho..

I used it with my gameshark, thats how I discovered it even had that port.

Ahh the good old Parallel port.. Wouldnt have been able buy so many games on my paper round wages without you xD

That port could be used with gameshark.

I don't know what was that thing but my uncle used it for watching VCD for the playstation

I don't have Playstation and I have a lots of nintendo gaming console like wii GameCube switch ds dsi

I want you to tell a story about the illegal 16 bit video game, Mario 4 the space odyssey for the sega mega drive and sega genesis.

Wth r u talkin? The explanaion bay was used daily in my ps1 back in the 90s

The SD!2 Know your rule soundtrack in the background

I had one ofthose ps1, mine was used foe an exploder cart which is a games genie really :) :) :)

The VCD cards were all kinds of ridiculous back in the day. The quality was amazing.

I used mine to play and insert VCD adaptor.

The explorer fx now that takes me back to my childhood 😂😂😂

I am not Lady Decade, but I am the Green Koopa

The lost playstation add on was the actual player missing now messing around with other console's

I have a X-ploder, It was great to use!

For me, it was for Gameshark and playing games imported from Japan.

My friend told me it was a printer port for coding. I know this can't be true now.

It pains to see the NES port cover snapping during removal.

I had a device I got from a Japanese shop that came with a spring to hold the disc tray button down and allowed you to switch out the disc from legit to burned. Sadly I had all the devices you listed all but the vcd add on.

I still have my action replay that used to plug in the parallel port as well as my original PS1, sadly the laser has completely died over the years. I bought an action replay the same month I bought my PS1 pretty much back in the summer of '98 and enjoyed its benefits from watching STR videos to listening to in-game STR music, using cheat codes, browsing discs for stuff, it was simply amazing. It was so impressive to me having a fully fledged file browser on a console similar to NC on PC.

So, unrelated to this specific video, but... am I just being daft, or does "decade" have a different meaning in British English from American English? I ask because "Lady 10 Years" doesn't make sense to me.

What does the PS1 FMV Cartridge connect?

I very highly doubt it was meant for debugging. I think it's pretty clear that it was intended for some kind of add-on or accessory, and I would have to agree with those theorizing it was probably intended for online purposes. My guess is either online multiplayer or a downloadable game service similar to the Sega Channel. Or perhaps it was intended for a device that boosted the console's power in some way, or an external hard drive.

back when expansion ports existed but only a few used them