I have a first generation PSP (PlayStation Portable) and after it’s charger over-heated and died I started using a variable adapter to charge it. Once while charging, I set the polarity on the adapter the wrong way around and well it burnt out the diode on the PSP circuit board!

So now I had a dead PSP because of a hardware problem. (Hint: I’m more of a software guy!)

After wasting a lot of time on google, I came across this one post on how to charge a first gen PSP via USB. Originally a first gen PSP does not support USB charging. All I had to do was solder a wire from the mini-USB port to the PSP power-port. Easy. Only that after opening up the case, it didn’t look so easy. And this is why:

For comparison, I took the photo next to a 5p coin. Yes that’s a 5 pence coin which is 18mm in diameter! It is the best and the neatest solder I’ve done so far without burning a hole through the circuit board or any other components!