xmb_gamecache — fast XMB Game menu for ARK-4 on big memory cards

PSP.XMB.-.CAP.-.Compressed.mp4

The load time to show items in my 128GB memory card was so frustrating! This plugin caches the data that slowed down you accessing your Game > Memory card.

This plugin also re-arranges items based on "last used" so most recently accessed items in your memory card are first.

Written by Fable 5, reviewed by me. Tested on my PSP1000 with ARK4. Use at your own risk of course. I can't guarantee this won't conflict with other plugins (this is my only plugin).

A VSH kernel plugin for PSPs running ARK-4 CFW that makes the XMB Game menu load near-instantly, no matter how many ISOs are on the card — including after waking from sleep.

The problems it solves

ARK-4 shows your ISOs in the XMB by presenting each one as a fake game folder. Every time the PSP boots back to the XMB (which happens every time you exit a game), ARK re-opens every ISO on the card and extracts its title, PARAM.SFO and icon again. ARK does have a built-in cache (ISOCACHE.BIN) but it is hard-capped at 32 games, and even cached games get their icons re-read out of the ISO every session. With a 128 GB card full of games, that's a long grind on every single reboot.

Separately, every time the XMB shows the Memory Stick's free space it re-counts every free cluster on the card from scratch — the firmware caches nothing — which stalls the UI for several seconds on a big card, most visibly after waking from sleep.

What it does

• Persistent game cache. Each game's synthesized metadata and icon bytes are kept in ms0:/PSP/SYSTEM/XMBGC.BIN for an unlimited number of ISOs. On a warm boot the game list is validated purely from the directory listing (file size + timestamp — no per-game file opens) and served straight from the cache.
• RAM mirror for sleep/wake. Game titles and icons are additionally mirrored in RAM (up to 2 MB) during the first Game-menu visit of a session. RAM survives sleep, so re-opening the game list after waking needs almost no card IO and appears in about a second.
• Instant free-space display. The slow free-cluster count runs once per boot (folded into the boot you already wait for); every later query — including after sleep — is answered instantly from that snapshot. Safety: once free space drops below 1 GB the real count is always used, so a nearly-full card is never misreported. (Trade-off: deleting/adding games mid-session can leave the figure slightly stale until the next boot — and any game launch reboots the XMB, so it corrects itself in normal use.)
• Recently-played-first ordering. Launches (ISO, homebrew, and PS1/POPS) are recorded, and recently played games sort to the top of the Game menu. This works by serving fake "newest" folder dates to the XMB, so it only applies when the XMB sorts by date (the default for the Memory Stick game list).
• Adding/removing/replacing ISOs is detected automatically; only new or changed ISOs are re-scanned.
• Backgrounds (PIC1), animated icons (ICON1) and sounds (SND0) are cached the first time the XMB actually shows them.
• First Game-menu visit after install: about as slow as stock (it builds the cache once). Every visit after that: near-instant.

Install

1. Copy xmb_gamecache.prx to ms0:/SEPLUGINS/.

2. Add this line to ms0:/SEPLUGINS/PLUGINS.TXT (create it if needed):

   vsh, ms0:/SEPLUGINS/xmb_gamecache.prx, on
   

3. Reboot the PSP. Open the Game menu once to build the cache (this first visit is slow — let it finish). After that, enjoy.

On a PSP Go using internal storage, use ef0:/SEPLUGINS/ and the ef0: path in the line above; the cache goes to ef0:/PSP/SYSTEM/XMBGC.BIN automatically.

Optional extra speed: also enable ARK's Memory Stick cache by adding vsh, mscache, on to the same PLUGINS.TXT.

Tested on

• PSP-1000 (32 MB), ARK-4, 128 GB Memory Stick (SD adapter), ms0:.

That is the honest extent of hardware testing so far. The plugin is designed to fail safe everywhere else — on any other CFW, any ARK-4 version with different internals, or any resolution failure it simply goes inert and you get stock behavior — but PSP Go internal storage (ef0:), other PSP models, and other ARK-4 releases are unverified. Reports (good and bad) are very welcome — please open an issue.

If something goes wrong

• The plugin is designed to fail safe: on any version mismatch or error it does nothing and you get stock (slow) behavior.
• If the XMB ever misbehaves, boot into ARK's Recovery Menu (hold R while powering on), go to Plugins, and disable it — or just delete the line from PLUGINS.TXT over USB.
• To force a full cache rebuild, delete ms0:/PSP/SYSTEM/XMBGC.BIN.
• To reset the recently-played ordering, delete ms0:/PSP/SYSTEM/XMBMRU.BIN.
• The cache file grows with your library (roughly 30–60 KB per game, plus backgrounds you've viewed). It self-compacts by rebuilding when bloat exceeds ~48 MB.

Known limitations

• Game Categories Lite: if that plugin is loaded, xmb_gamecache automatically steps aside (stock speed) so categories keep working.
• ISOs with file names longer than ~110 characters are skipped.
• The 1.50-addon (GAME150) listing and everything else (PSN eboots, homebrew folders, videos, savedata) passes through to ARK untouched.
• The free-space figure is a per-boot snapshot (see above); below 1 GB free it is always the real count.
• Sorting the Game menu by anything other than date bypasses the recently-played ordering (by design — only the dates are faked).
• ARK-4 only. On any other CFW the plugin stays inert.

Building from source

Requires the pspdev toolchain:

export PSPDEV=~/pspdev
export PATH=$PSPDEV/bin:$PATH
make

How it works (short version)

At boot the plugin finds VshCtrl's exported XMB IO handlers and patches the syscall table entries pointing at them, so its wrappers run first. During a Game-menu directory open it feeds VshCtrl a fake, empty /ISO directory (import hooks on VshCtrl's kernel IO) so ARK's slow per-ISO parser never runs, enumerates /ISO itself, and serves the game list from the cache. Launching, deleting, and game updates (PBOOT/DLC/ manuals) are handled by replicating ARK's own logic on top of its exported helpers (isoOpen/isoRead, sctrlSE* launch APIs). The free-space devctl (0x02425818) is intercepted at the user syscall table, so kernel callers always see the real count. PS1/POPS launches are caught by trampolining SystemControl's central LoadExec function.

Disclaimer

This software is provided as is, without warranty of any kind, and the author accepts no liability for any damage arising from its use — see sections 15 and 16 of the LICENSE. Use it at your own risk.

Just in case: an XMB freeze is recovered by holding the power switch off and disabling the plugin via ARK's Recovery Menu (hold R at power-on) or by deleting its line from PLUGINS.TXT over USB.

Credits & license

GPL-3.0-or-later. Portions derived from ARK-4 / PRO CFW — thanks to the ARK team, whose exported kernel APIs make plugins like this possible.