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PSP Trigger LED Modification Tutorial

Posted Jul 28, 2006 at 04:14PM by Jamie M. Listed in: Mods, News Tags: eBay, faceplate
Ó

led


Today we are going to break open our precious PSP's once again. This time for some nice cosmetic enhancements. Right off the bat I would like to warn this is a moderately difficult modification. However with the necessary tools and some patience you will be on your way to a sweet looking PSP in no time. I see you sitting there at your PC palming your PSP as  I speak, so without further ado let's hop to it...

Supplies:

In order to perform this modification you will need a few tools and supplies. Everything should be available from Radio Shack. Just this last time when I went in they did not carry 26 Gauge Wire (AWG). I'm not sure if this is only my location or nationwide so I have specified other places to obtain parts.

Two SMT LED's (Surface Mount) - eBay
Soldering Iron and Solder - Radio Shack, Ebay, etc. (many places)
26 Gauge Wire - Sometimes marked AWG - Usually available at Radio Shack [eBay, Mouser]
Shrink Wrap / Electrical Tape
10 ohm resistor - eBay, Mouser
Drill - optional
Small Phillips and Flat Head Screwdrivers

Supplies
A few items you will need [ Battery and Penny shown for size comparison]


First remove your faceplate. This is what the phillips is for so break it out and get to work. A few screws on the back (including in your battery compartment. Finally a single screw on the bottom will allow you access to the inside of your PSP. Here's the next few steps, check the image below as a guide.
  1. First we need to remove the home bar assembly. This is the bottom row including Home, screen brightness etc. Find the clip on the right and use your small screwdriver to flip it up to remove the cable. Then slide your Home Bar Assembly off the LCD screen.
  2. This part is a bit more tricky. Take your flat head screwdriver and place it in the square holes marked above. Then press in gently and pry the screen upwards. I unclip two on the same side [left or right] then the screen pops out easily.
  3. Now that you are able to life the screen upwards you will have access to the 2 cables that connect the LCD screen to your PSP. Gently pry the larger of the two up like you did previously with the Home Bar Assembly. When you get to the smaller of the two wires carefully pull the wire out. When removing the wire make sure not to pull up on the wire, and just pull directly away from its connection.
  4. Now your LCD will be completely unattached from your PSP. Place it to the side and remove the screws that are marked in the image above. There are 7 screws in total (place these to the side as well). Now you can remove the LCD mounting bracket.

Process

Chaos, not quite. A few simple steps and you will be ready to proceed.


First you will need to remove the triggers from their spot on the top left and right of the PSP (Ok, I think we know where the triggers are). So once you have removed them now...

Its Decision Making Time!

Well folks, heres the decisive moment. You need to decide if you are going to drill into your PSP Triggers or not. I personally found it to be better in the long run however there are a few advantages and disadvantages both ways. For example, If you choose to not drill into your triggers the light emitted from your LED will be a bit more dim then it would be if you do use the drill. Drilling could also be potentially dangerous since the triggers themselves are rather small. You could also ruin your Triggers since there is a slight possibility of drilling straight through your Trigger. If you are inexperienced in certain areas theres no harm in asking someone for help. (This feels kinda like one of those pick your own adventure books.)


If you have decided NOT to drill the triggers you will need to pass up this next section and Jump to Making the LED Circuit.

If you decided you are going to drill the triggers you will need to take a drill and make a hole a little bit bigger then your SMT LED. There are a number of different sized LEDs that fit under the SMT LED category. I purchased mine from a eBay seller from China. They make good leds and are extremely cheap if you want to buy them in bulk. I purchased 50 leds for about $15 including shipping. Just 2 may cost you up to $6 or $8 bucks at your local Radio Shack. Once you see the result you will want to have more laying around for projects, trust me.

 trigger leds


Take your triggers and drill a hole into the highest part of the slope in the center as pictured above. Use a drill that is one size larger then your LED. Needless to say if your LED is larger then the trigger you got the wrong ones and dont proceed before replacing them. ;) Once you have drilled your Trigger buttons, make sure that your LED fits in easily. At this point you might consider making a test solder to make sure you have enough room for the LED and the wire as well.

circuit
Making the LED Circuit


parallel circuits
A Parallel circuit for LED's is a circuit which incorperates a number of LED's together in which the same drop is shared between all LED's on the chain. What this means to you is that each LED that you attach will use the exact same voltage as theWe are going to learn how to setup a simple circuit for our project. The circuit is completed in this case by whats called a Parallel the other ones. Which results in all LED's giving off the same amount of light. Here is a textbook example of a typical Parallel LED Circuit provided by Metku.


stringSo now that we have the basic structure of a LED circuit down we need to apply this to our PSP Trigger LED Mod. I measure out the lenth of wire I will need for my project so I have it handy (especially if I am planning to do more then one modification that day.) As you can see from the image on the left we have the wire soldered to the positive conductor, then to the resistor (hidden in the electrical tape) and finally bridging the LED's in parallel and coming back via the negitive wire (not attached yet in the image). Similar to the picture in above and to the right, you can trace the wires to see they make the exact same style of circuit.


resistorHeres a sneek peek into how the resistor was hooked up. I have taking the resistor and bent one of the legs back up against the side of it (typical if you have modified Xbox Controller Ports to add leds. Then you are able to solder a short length of wire onto the end (for the positive connection) and wrap the resistor up. You will be able to then solder the positive wire to the respective contact point and procede with wiring up your LED harness.

In order to get a really good connection make sure that the items you are trying to bond stay in a fixed location for a few seconds after the solder connection is made. Also remember that too much or too little solder can both cause problems. The better your can get the connections the better, however you may need to open up your PSP again to adjust the wires if the circuit isn't working correctly for your LED Modification.

Now that you have your LED's wired up, it would be a wise idea to test them prior to inserting them into the triggers (or the other location we will get to in a minute). Make sure all the wires are looking good, and nothings touching, then pop your battery back into the PSP. Flip the switch to the on position and if you did everything correctly you will be rewarded with some nice bright light coming from your SMT LED's. If your LED's don't turn on, double check to make sure the wires are correct and that you didn't accidently hook up the LED backwards (which happens to the best of us).

no drillIf you did not drill your triggers now that you have mastered making a circuit you need to check the spot where the LED is installed. When not drilling the LED will be installed in a tiny cavity behind the trigger. In the small picture on the bottom you can see how the wire is bent keeping a low profile to retain responciveness. When you install the led make sure that it is as far back as possible and you can use a bit of hot glue to keep it in place. Once both LED's are installed put your triggers back in and if you want toss your faceplate on (without LED screen etc to see how they look and modify as necessary. Once you are satisfied, reassemble your PSP and enjoy!

However, If you are putting the LED's in your Triggers then you will need to take the leds and insert them into the holes that you drilled previously and then use the hot glue gun to seal them in. Once sealed inside this will keep them from moving around a bit and aid your solder connections. Then you can simply insert the Triggers back in their normal position and if you want to double check (not a bad idea) toss in your battery and flip on and off your PSP again to make sure they are still working and the buttons motion is not hindered by the wire or glue. If everything looks good you can seal up your PSP and enjoy the new modification thanks to your fine handywork.


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56 Comments


Sort by:
   by galgor (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » aye
eh..most of that post shouldn't be on the main page imo. "read full article" would be appropriate.

   by Unregistered (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » Freakin sweet
This looks nice like that DS mod where they cut the DS logo into the shell and stuffed it with LED's :)

   by Cao - 2006-07-28
 » .
Does article this explain what it does?

   by Mystic8277 - 2006-07-28
 » .
That looks pretty sick.

   by Eric The Midget (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » Okay....
So what exactly does this do? I don't see anything in the article that explains it clearly.

   by carlo aguilera (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » holy crap
through logic, it is easy to see its a cosmetic mod...nothing more nothing less

   by ben (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » what is it.
What it does is it makes the L and R triggers glow.

   by sssss (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » hehe
@7# it isn't a cosmetic mod... with this mod you will be able to play all homebrews (inklusive nds homebrew) and you can be the master of the earth :DDDDD

must I put the battery into the PSP?!

   by Advertising -
   by pspizzle - 2006-07-28
 » That actually looks pretty cosha
nocomment

   by YUN (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » haha
loool n1 #9

   by pimpc (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » if you dont know
if you dont know what it does i dont reccomend doing it!

   by Jamie M. (QJ. NET Staff) - 2006-07-28
 » For those who noticed
While this is getting the same effect as another tutorial mentioned, this one allows you to do the install w/o drilling into your Trigger buttons. Those who commented on that might have missed that point.

   by Dark_Lord - 2006-07-28
 » Cool
I'm impressed, the only problem is it takes time and some skill level which I may not posses, but then again nothing good/flashy comes cheap.

   by Pal (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » Hmm
I would capitalize "LED". It's an acronym, after all.

Nice mod, though I think the novelty would wear off after the first 15 minutes of using it. Never was a fan of adding distractions to my game consoles, but hey, the kids'll love it.

   by Arconn27 (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » Soildering ????
Can you ruin your psp or its components from the soildering heat? and do you need a heat sink?

   by 2.6 (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » not worth it to me...
I'm sure it looks very nice, but it's not worth voiding the warrenty and thats the least that could happen.

My hardware modding stops with my xbox:
Clear plexyglass case (not the stock looking ones either(Xpod)
3 fans with control knobs
4 controlable multi-color leds
cd drive cut to see the drive spin
blue&white halo
2 usb sockets
300GB HDD running XBMC
and red leds on the controller motors {rumble rumble}
Ohhhh yaaaaaa baby :)

   by soopergooman - 2006-07-28
 » ...
Funny, I posted about this months ago in the forums here and other places.(maxconsole...)

   by Advertising -
   by PSPrometheus - 2006-07-28
 » Cute but don't see the point
Don't get me wrong I love mods/hacks but there are some things I don't get. Modding to upgrade components is useful, ie. extra fans, LED monitor for CPU temp. All in all anything that adds usefulness makes complete sense. I have for instance UP my PSP, and installed the PSP2TV mod. Both add features to the PSP so I understand them. Doing this doesn't make sense to me since you could frag your psp in a big way when the only gain is little blue lights that I imagine would be a pain in the butt while watching or playing your psp. It's just my opinion but to me this makes about as much sense as adding flashing LEDs to your boxer shorts.

   by hoog (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » not worth it
mite bust my psp and i cant afford another + the warranty would be void so iwouldnt be able to get another

   by lordroba - 2006-07-28
 » ooh
looks like the psp got hit by lightning or something. Nice mod, but definitly not something I want to be trying with my PSP. Maybe in a few years though... :P

   by windoo (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » wont it waste the battery quicker ?
wont it waste the battery quicker ?

   by pauridius - 2006-07-28
 » Woah looks awesome
wow, looks badass. Might try it if i have the time and courage to do it :P

   by Kriogenic (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » Nice
This is real nice i might try it i was originally planning to do this anyway but never knew how to do it correctly and i still dont :S the tutorial didnt quite say where to solder to on the actual psp im guessing the picture with the

NEGATIVE and then the 2 things and
POSSITIVE

was meant to tell us but yeah do we solder to both the green or one to the green the other to the positive im so confused....

   by Matt123 (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » LED
LEDs dont eat up batterys much more than like 0.01%. They use low level of batterys.

   by RaiderX - 2006-07-28
 » awesome!!
been waitign for him to put up his tut on this! Now I can finally do this mod w/o having to worry about messing ***** up cuz I did it on my own.

   by N35QU1K (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » PSP Rice Rocket
Hahaha, turn your PSP into a rice rocket.

   by Jamie M. (QJ. NET Staff) - 2006-07-28
 » Kriogenic
A real quick rundown, you are going to take power from the positive, then go through the resistor which gives the LED's proper voltage. Then, solder the negitive wire coming from the LED to the "Green" or "Orange" location (only one of the two). I am assuming most everyone will want to solder to the negitive contact point which is marked in green as that keeps the lights on while playing.

Hope that helps =)

   by Advertising -
   by j453113 (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » YES
nocomment

   by j453113 (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » YES
THIS MOD IS GGREAT!!! i put leds on most of my things anyway and my psp was another thing that i wanted it on. THIS IS A GREAT MOD SO DONT DISRESPECT IT!!!!

   by j453113 (Unregistered) - 2006-07-28
 » btw
well... since i dun wanna solder nothin to ma psp's mainboard, ill make an intervention system so that i make the led's run from the batteries...oOO yea... now i gotta giv it a switch... dats ok... im capable of it



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