Console Hacking 2016 (33c3)
Console Hacking 2016 (33c3) on HackerTube: recommended by 4 Hacker News commenters across 3 separate months, 2017–2024.
A 33c3 talk by marcan on reverse engineering the PS4 hardware to run Linux with 3D acceleration. It covers how the console differs from a PC and includes a story about tunneling PCIe over RS-232.
What HN commenters said
9 Hacker News comments link this video. Each one links back to its thread.
s1gsegvApr 2024Recommends
This is a good watch, it goes into detail on the architecture of the PS4 showing how it differs from a standard x86_64 “PC.” ▶ this video The “too long; didn’t watch” summary is that there’s several peripherals, timers, RTC, etc outside of the processor that software will expect to be present (or at least emulated) with specific interfaces. You can implement x86_64 without a lot of this, or redone in a more modern style, but software such as a Linux kernel will have to be patched for it. Typically a modern laptop will have all the legacy peripherals emulated, and the modern peripherals will live alongside them.
in “How to reenable undervolting in 2020 Dell Laptops by editing EFI variables” · View on HN
lathiatNov 2021Recommends
The key is on the console (not server side). Historically either they made some silly choices or there was a hardware bug or glitch that let you read out the key that the processor has to be able to access to decrypt the firmware. Search YouTube for fail0verflow and there are some great CCC talks very approachable and understandable about how it was done on other consoles historically. PS4: ▶ this video Wii U: [link]
in “Hacking group says it has found encryption keys needed to unlock the PS5” · View on HN
izacusMar 2017Recommends
While the CPU is indeed x86-64, the architecture of the SoC and the device is rather different so emulation still won't be all that easy. This 33c3 talk gives a lot of fascinating information on how PS4 differs from your run-of-the-mill PC and what kind of issues they hit when trying to run Linux on it: ▶ this video
in “What the death of the CRT display technology means for classic arcade machines” · View on HN
jvdhMar 2017Recommends
`It's interesting to note that the PS4 OS is also a forked FreeBSD variant as well.` Here's a nice talk at CCC last year which explains some bits of FreeBSD in the PS4. It's mostly about hardware and how to run Linux on it, but FreeBSD gets a nice mention there too. ▶ this video
in “The BSD family tree” · View on HN
drekipusOct 2021Cites it
If I remember correctly that's similar what the PS3 did, but that's a different issue and comes with cool discussions This talk is about the PS4, similar in concept ▶ this video
in “Google developing own CPUs for Chromebook laptops” · View on HN
marcan_42Dec 2020Cites it
Ah, but have you ever run PCIe over 115200 baud serial? :) We did that for the PS4 hardware experiments, and that also involved a PCIe hotplug capable motherboard, as we had a PS4 southbridge patched in as a PCIe device on a normal PC, and every time we powered on the PS4 that was effectively hotplugging it. Fun times. These days PCIe hotplug is a consumer technology, it's called Thunderbolt (it's hotplug at the logical layer, not physical PCIe lanes, but to the OS/software it's about the same). PS4 talk including the PCIe story: ▶ this video
in “Raspberry Pi PCIe Devices” · View on HN
Show 3 more comments
raverbashingFeb 2020Cites it
Reminds me of some PS4 or Xbox (I think) reverse engineering video where they they tunneled PCI-E over RS232 (around 8m15s) ▶ this video
in “Cursed Adapters” · View on HN
wmfFeb 2019Cites it
PCIe is also packet-based BTW [1]. The benefit from the custom protocol is being able to run PCIe and DisplayPort (and I guess networking which no one cares about) over the same cable at the same time with dynamic bandwidth allocation. USB-C has alternate modes but they're not as powerful. In theory PCIe alternate mode over USB-C should be possible and it would be much simpler than Thunderbolt but nobody has tried to build it. I imagine the spec doesn't really exist because Intel has been too lazy to properly write it (I wouldn't be surprised if Thunderbolt is basically defined as whatever the original Ridge controller implemented) and it's probably also gross. Adoption seems to be limited by cost, not by secrecy (thinking back to Firewire, it was open but there were very few controller chips for it). [1] Check out PCIe over RS-232: ▶ this video
in “Struck by a Thunderbolt” · View on HN
AsookaMar 2017Cites it
> since using a vanilla kernel would make a public exploit in say, FreeBSD, easily ported to their device You mean like at the recent CCC where they demonstrated using a WebKit exploit to trigger a BSD exploit via which they install a working Linux system on a PS4 and launch Steam? Link: ▶ this video It's not as simple as that because the PS4 is a custom board, so even though the CPU and GPU are standard AMD components, some hacking was required. But using exploits that have long been patched to gain access to hardware by Sony and Nintendo is nothing new.
in “Ask HN: Why is BSD becoming more popular in embedded devices?” · View on HN