How to use your PSP as a Phone

In anticipation of my newest toy, I spent a lot of time online last night, reading up on all the cool $hit that a PSP can do. And I tell you...I was amazed. You can hook a 360 controller up to your PSP and play games with it (inc headset). You can use it to monitor people's hearts in a hospital (wi-fi heart monitors), you can set it on your coffee table, go into another room, and use a computer to control any IR device it may be pointed at (wi-fi!). You can run whole PSone and PSP games from a remote wlan connection. You can use it as a GPS receiver.

But one of the most interesting features I learned about was the ability to turn your PSP into a VOIP phone. I know that Skype already has this feature, but then you're limited to using Skype's services. This method will allow you to use any VOIP provider (as long as they support SIP).

This means that, provided you're within range of a hotspot or ad-hoc internet connection, you can make and receive calls from your PSP.

WHAT YOU NEED:

A PSP running custom firmware -

(tested on 3.71 M33-2). Other later builds of the M33 fw's should work. 1.5 will not.

A headset -

I found one on Ebay for $5.00, including shipping. Just search for "PSP headset". Basically, you can use any USB headset or SOCOM-style headset.

Furikup VOIP software & Wi-fi sniffer –

Download from Rapidshare...because I know you want to.

Both programs are included in the download. Just extract to the root drive of your memstick. Also, included is the readme for complete usage of Furikup.

A VOIP Connection using a SIP server -

I recommend using either VOIPCheap (UK) or Inphonex (US).

VOIPCheap is probably the best provider I've seen, and would choose to use if I lived in the UK. They provide you with 300 free minutes for incoming and outgoing calls to per month. 300 minutes isn't a LOT, but it's still free.

InPhonenix is cool because, for $25 a month, you get unlimited calls to anywhere in the US, as well as your own Incoming number. They’ve also got a $7.50/mo pay-as-you-go plan, where calls are something like 2 cents a minute. Not too bad.

Both providers support SIP and IPphones, which is exactly what you need for the software to work. Also, I believe that both providers support web-web calling, web-phone calling, and every other variation (including SMS).

Configuring Furikup to work with your VOIP Provider:

Under PSP>game>Furikup, you’ll see a file called “sipcfg.ini”. Yes, this is where the information about your SIP provider is stored. You’ll need to edit this so your PSP knows how to deal with incoming and outgoing calls.

Open the file in a text editor.

Here are the parameters you need to configure:

Server - The name of the SIP server to register with. This will also be used as your SIP proxy. There's no need to specify a port number. Server for inphonex is “sip.inphonex.com” Server for VoipCheap is “sip.VoipCheap.com”

Username - Your username for the SIP server.
Password - Your password for the SIP server.
Stunserver – Leave blank. Only tested on one provider.
Stunport – Leave Blank.
Input - The type of input to use for audio. Options are:

• usbcam : use the Go!Cam (Chotto Shot) camera microphone
• usbmic : use the Talkman USB microphone
• headset : use a SOCOM-style headset (There are plenty of tutorials on the internet showing how to make your own, e.g. here).
• file : read audio from a WAV file. This file must be called audio.wav, with format 44.1kHz, 16-bit mono, and placed in the Furikup folder.

Logfile - The filename to log debug information to.
Disablenat - Used to disable NAT traversal, should only need to be used on private networks. Set to "yes" to enable.


Okay, so, you should now have everything configured properly. Save the file to your memcard, and you should be ready to use your new IPphone.

Wi-Fi sniffer

I included a wi-fi sniffer for one obvious reason…finding open networks to make calls on. In an urban area, this shouldn’t be too hard to do. Just open the sniffer, and watch the screen. Not only will it display signal strength, but it should also show you the direction of where the signal is coming from. Red=Encrypted servers, Green=Open.

[xXDistortXx]

Noooooooooooooooooooice.

[Danhrules]

Nice I think it's about time I dusted off the old PSP.

BTW, does the playing-games-from-a-PC-over-wireless feature work properly now? Last time I used my PSP, it was just in it's infancy and never worked too well. I've got to try this out now!

[digitalhigh]

Yes Dahn, the newest version of IRshell supports a MASSIVE array of hosting options. Not only does it let you play PSP games over wifi, but you can access PSONE saves, PSstore downloads, movies, music, and I believe even DVD's in the DRIVE.

Pimpish...if you ask me.

[Danhrules]

Awesome!

[sxtrailreece]

after seeing this im getting out the good old psp now

[Minkis]

WOW very interesting i guess