!!exclusive!! | Umdgen

PSP memory sticks were expensive, and file sizes were large. UMDGen allowed users to strip out unnecessary content to save space. You could load an ISO, delete the UPDATE folder, and—more drastically—remove padding files, dummy data, or even movies/music to shrink a 1.8 GB game down to a few hundred megabytes.

UMDGen was the primary way to convert between file formats: umdgen

: After making changes—such as adding a translation patch or removing "dummy" data—UMDGen can rebuild the file into a bootable image for use on a PSP or an emulator like PPSSPP. PSP memory sticks were expensive, and file sizes were large

At its simplest, UMDGen allows you to open a PSP game ISO and view its file structure. It lets you extract files, add new ones, delete existing ones, and then rebuild the ISO so it remains playable. This process is known as or ripping . UMDGen was the primary way to convert between

Development of UMDGEN effectively stopped around 2009 (versions 3.00 to 4.00 saw minor updates). The author, a coder known as "poison," vanished from the scene. The tool was never open-sourced.