I can't unbrick my PSP Phat!

[themadhacker]

get a flashlight and shine it behind the screen when you turn on the psp.

[slowman]

Not to be a negative nancy but it sounds like the same problem I was having with mine. I honestly think its a full brick. I never did bother to really try and fix it and there are a couple things I might still try and do. At this point, you've got nothing to lose by bridging the power fuse.

As far as trying to see the backlight goes.... you could just turn it on and crank the sound up. Then use the D-pad to navigate around the menu and listen for the key tone.

If you don't have the key tone activated on, then put some music on a mem stick. Then you could go all the way to the left in the XMB, then go all the way up. Then two clicks to the right, then one down. Hit X to start the music. If you hear it then that's VERY good. It tells you that you don't have a paperweight. All you'd need to do is bridge the backlight fuse, and that's a pretty easy fix.

[Twilight Wolf]

Okay, new problems.

I got myself another PSP, a Phat again. This one worked, though, and it even had 5.00 M33-4 on it. However, after I put the "Ridge Racer" EBOOT I made out of a .bin file onto my Memory Stick, and it stopped working. I turned it off, and then back on. I couldn't navigate around the XMB, but I could see it. Talking to Palmer about this, he told me I should try reflashing it, so I did. I used Rain's Simple MMS Maker to make the Magic Memory Stick, put it in my PSP while holding down L, and I selected "install 4.01 M33." After it got to 30-odd percent complete, I got an error and it stopped and brought me back to the menu. I turned the PSP off, remade the MMS... now the PSP doesn't do anything more than my old one did. Back to square one again, and if it turns out I wasted another $135, I swear I'm gonna steal someone's car and drive it off a cliff. I can't afford to have another broken PSP, especially when it WAS working fine.

EDIT: Dammit, I'm a moron. The WiFi switch was on, but when I turned it off, it started working again. Flashing 3.90 M33 now.

EDIT +1: 3.90 working fine now. I fail.