Converting to ATRAC3plus for Fake Memory Stick Owners.

Who's this for?
*Fake Memory Stick Users
*Or for people who want to convert their music to ATRAC3plus without copy protection.

Fake Memory Stick Check
On your 3.00+, 3.00+ devhooked or 3.02OE+ firmware go to the memory stick icon under photo, music, movie or game. Press triangle and go down to information and press X. If it says MagicGate Unknown it is a fake memory stick. If it says MagicGate Compatible it is a genuine memory stick.

Requirements?
*Fake Memory Stick
*Genuine Memory Stick or A blank CD

Explain?
After getting my fake Sony High Speed 2gb memory stick yesterday (An excellent gift from my friend ) I realised you cannot convert music to ATRAC3plus to a fake memory stick. I tried and Sonic Stage gave me an error saying it could'nt transfer. So I thought I would try a different method. I converted music to ATRAC3plus to my genuine memory stick using Sonic Stage. Then I went to the removeable disk and copied the OMGAUDIO folder out of the root of my genuine Sandisk Gaming 1gb memory stick to the root of my fake sony high speed 2gb memory stick. Sadly this did'nt work, as when you convert music to ATRAC3plus to a memory stick, copy protection is added allowing the songs to only play back on one PSP and on one computer. I thought I was doomed, but then one song was playing fine. This song I had converted to my hard disk earlier. So as a final throw of the dice I did this. I converted all the music to ATRAC3plus to my hard disk. Then I transferred the tracks to my genuine Sandisk Gaming 1gb memory stick. Then I copied the OMGAUDIO and pasted it onto my fake Sony High Speed 2gb memory stick, and hey what do you know, it was working fine.

Basically in other words there are two ways you can convert to ATRAC3plus using Sonic Stage. Either convert direct to a memory stick. The problem with this is that copy protection is added. But if you convert to your hard disk then you can choose whether to add copy protection or not.

How To?
1: Download the latest version of Sonic Stage from here:
http://www.connect.com/download_cookie.html

2: Install it.

3: Open up Sonic Stage. Import your music into the software. Do this by clicking file at the top, then selecting import, then choose scan folder. Go to settings and select the folder you keep all your music (My Music for me) and ensure all file formats are ticked. Hit ok. Now select search. All your songs will be imported into Sonic Stage.

4: When this is done, on the side it says view. Click the drop down menu and select all tracks.

5: Go to edit at the top and press select all.

6: Right click on any song and go to Convert Format...

7: Select the settings you want, I personally go for ATRAC3plus 48 kbps. It gives me the smallest files, and they sound fine to me.

8: Make sure Add Copy Protection is NOT ticked.

9: Hit convert.

10: Now go to transfer, at the top.

11: If you have a decent sized genuine memory stick then select that. If not, just select Create an ATRAC3 CD instead.

12: Choose the songs you want to transfer, you can organise them into playlists, or if you select album view from the left hand side, you can transfer them album by album.

13: Next click the settings button in the middle (Its just like the Settings icon on the PSP)

14: Select specified bit rate transfer, and ensure the settings are the same as you used earlier, my reccomended was 48 kbps.

15: Press ok.

16: Now press the arrow on top of the settings and the music will be transferred.

17: After this is done open up the Genuine Memory stick or CD using Windows Explorer. Do this by browsing the mediums throw My Computer.

18: Copy the OMGAUDIO folder onto your computer.

19: Drag and drop this OMGAUDIO folder into the root of your fake memory stick.

20: Enjoy your no copy protection ATRAC3plus files on your fake memory stick.

Sonic Stage ATRAC3Plus 48 kbps Compression Example
*All my music in .mp3/.wma = 985mb (294 songs)
*All my music in .oma (Atrac3plus 48 kbps) = 249mb (294 songs)
Space Saved: 736mb
The music sounds fine, no quality lost as far as I can hear