Just as Sony keeps releasing little tweaks to the PlayStation Portable's firmware to add even more security and, sometimes, new features, those keen on keeping the PSP as open a platform as possible also keep on churning out regular custom firmware updates.

One of the best and most trusted of these steadfast developers is Dark AleX, who first burst onto the PSP homebrew scene with a UMD dumper and solidified his reputation with his Special and Open Edition custom firmware. He has since moved on to developing M33 CFW, the latest release of which is CFW 5.00 M33. That's the firmware we'll be shining the spotlight on in this issue of QuickJump QuickGuide.

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First, some history.

In the latter part of 2008 Sony released a new PSP firmware dubbed 5.00. It was the first "universal" update for all three PSP models. As such, OFW 5.00 was a pretty substantial update that added direct PSN access and a PSN category to the XMB, among other things.

Within 24 hours, Dark Alex had already released a PSARDUMPER for OFW 5.00. A couple of days later, 5.00 M33 was out. What can I say? The man works really fast. The first release of 5.00 M33 included the features found in the official Sony firmware as well as a bugfix:

• When changing speed in XMB, and the PSP turned the brightness to 0 automatically the speed was reseted to 222 again.

DAX also released a PSX bugfix for 5.00 M33 a short while later after users started reporting error 0xFFFFFFFF messages appearing while launching PSX games on the new CFW. A  1.50 kernel add-on for 5.00 M33 also followed a short while later.

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5.00 M33-2 was the first major update for the new CFW. It fixed a lot of the problems users encountered while trying out the new PSN feature as well as further issues concerning PSX games. The release of the update was also accompanied by a new Popsloader version which, according to DAX, was to be "the Popsloader for 5.00 M33-2 and up (until Sony screws it again)."

The next update followed a mere day later. 5.00 M33-3 was a smaller update compared to the first, but it did add a very important new feature: it let users bypass the PSN's version check automatically without having to fiddle around with anything. This was to be the last update we would get for a while.

Almost two months after 5.00 M33-3, update 4 was released. Along with the bugfixes, this update also made UMD/ISO speed settings apply to PSN games. Another noteworthy feature was a new shutdown option added to the VSH menu, which turned out to be a boon to those whose PSP power switches were already in bad shape.

If you know your math, you're well aware that the next update was 5.00 M33-5. This update was another stab at increasing memory stick speeds on the PSP, something that was being tried as far back as 3.. It eventually got rolled into one release with 5.00 M33-6, which arrived just moments later.

Aside from coming out right after update 5, 5.00 M33-6 also arrived right on the heels of the release of Sony's official firmware 5.03. It only had one item in the changelog, but it was the one thing that finally convinced me to update:

• Fixed a bug that made unbootable psp without memory stick or with a bad one.

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As you may have gathered from some of the problems and fixes described above, every new custom firmware update can cause compatibility problems with homebrew apps and plugins released for earlier firmware versions. 5.00 M33 has been out for quite a while now, though, so a lot of devs have already released compatible versions of their apps. Here are just a few that work with 5.00 M33:

• iR Shell
• Despertar del Cementerio v8
• PSP Pandora Deluxe v2.9
• FuSa SD
• CXMB v3.3

Well, there you have it folks, the lowdown on Dark AleX's 5.00 M33 custom firmware as well as its associated updates. If you're more inclined to look at the complete changelogs for all the updates, just give the links above a click. Stay tuned for a new QuickGuide coming next Tuesday.