Sony Playstation Memory Card

From HwB

The Playstation Memory Cards have an interface similar to the Controller Port, which is aswell similar to SPI. They normally have 1 Mb or 128 Kilobyte of EEprom memory. Bigger Non-Sony Cards use internal bankswitching (Multiple virtual Cards in one).

Pinout

8 PIN UNKNOWN CONNECTOR

  1  2   3  4  5   6  7  8 
----------------------------
| o  o | o  o  o | o  o  o |  (at the Card)
\__________________________/

Pin	Name	Description
1	DATA	Data from card (MISO)
2	CMD	Command/Data to card (MOSI)
3	+7V	7.6VDC
4	GND	Ground
5	VCC	Vcc (3,6 VDC)
6	/ATT	Select (SS)
7	CLK	Clock (SCK)
8	/ACK	Acknowledge

Note: Direction is PlayStation relative Card.

Signals

DATA

Signal from Card to PSX. This signal is an 8 bit serial transmission synchronous to the falling edge of clock (That is both the incoming and outgoing signals change on a high to low transition of clock. All the reading of signals is done on the leading edge to allow settling time.)

COMMAND

Signal from PSX to Card. This signal is the counter part of DATA. It is again an 8 bit serial transmission on the falling edge of clock.

VCC

VCC (heared to be) 3.6V. The main board in the PSX also has a surface mount 750mA fuse that will blow if you try to draw to much current through the plug (750mA is for both left, right and memory cards).

ATT

ATT is used to get the attention of the card. This signal will go low for the duration of a transmission.

CLOCK

Signal from PSX to card. Used to keep units in sync. 250KHz clock for PlayStation

ACK

Acknowledge signal from Card to PSX. This signal should go low for at least one clock period after each 8 bits are sent and ATT is still held low. If the ACK signal does not go low within about 60 us the PSX will then start interogating other devices.

Sources