PicoMemcard Makes Your Old PSX Memory Cards Obsolete

If you happen to own a PSX and want a better memory card experience, the open source PicoMemcard device is for you.

Daniele Giuliani designed PicoMemcard for use with PSX models, but tested it specifically on a PSOne. The primary benefit of PicoMemcard, compared to normal first-party and third-party memory cards, is the ability to transfer files to or from the device via a USB connection to a computer. That means you can backup your game saves, or even load up interesting saves created by other players. It also lets you easily load FreePSXBoot, so you can play burned CDs – functionality that the standard Playstation firmware doesn’t include.

To build your own PicoMemcard, you will need an existing memory card. It doesn’t matter if it is an official card or knock-off. In fact, it doesn’t even matter if it works. All you need from the original memory card is the edge connector on the PCB. Alternatively, you could download Giuliani’s custom PCB design and send it to a PCB fabrication service. That gives you a cleaner final product and doesn’t require an existing memory card at all.

PicoMemcard utilizes a Raspberry Pi Pico, which is a $5 microcontroller development board. Giuliani’s code makes the Pico simulate a PSX memory card and also allows for the USB file transfer functionality. As far as the PSX is concerned, it is looking at a normal memory card. Though it isn’t yet available, Giuliani plans to implement an SD card storage feature in the future.