Plug it into your system and you'll never go hungry for memory cards again.
Details
Specs:	Plugs into parallel port; Purple color; Saves up to 60 memory cards worth of saves.
By:	InterAct
Category:	Memory Pak
Price:	39.99

Are memory cards too expensive? Or are they just cluttering up your desk? InterAct may have the answer.

April 28, 1999

InterAct keeps pushing out these unique devices for the PlayStation. Its newest accessory: the V-Mem. Short for Virtual Memory, the V-Mem plugs into the parallel port of your PlayStation and gives you the ability to save as many as 60 memory cards of save games to the device. Weird, huh? Well, it really does work. How? Read on.

This oddly shaped peripheral looks like a purple bar of soap. Once it's plugged in, it sits flushed against the back of the system and stays put. When the PlayStation's turned on, you're faced with the V-Mem load screen instead of the PlayStation boot-up. The first time you use the device it has to take about 2 minutes to format the memory, but that's a one-time-only hassle. But after the format, any time you want to access the V-Mem, you have to hold down a controller button when you turn on the power.

When you've activated the V-Mem, you're faced with an image of a PlayStation, and a row of memory cards numbered 1 to 60. All you have to do is select a card and "place" it in the slot of the front of the "PlayStation". Once you've done that, the device tricks the PlayStation into thinking there's a memory card installed in the slot. You can have two "memory cards" plugged in, one in slot one, one in slot two. Games will see a memory card in the slots that you've installed a V-Mem card into, and they will save directly to the device instead of the memory card. Neat trick.

You can even copy from a real memory card to a virtual memory card. Here's how: Put a memory card into one of the slots, and "install" a virtual memory card into the other slot. When you're in the V-Mem screen, hit the Select button – this will bring up a text box telling you to pop the drive lid and hit the X button so the system can boot up to the Memory Card/CD Player screen. If you enter the Memory Card menu, you can copy from the physical card to the virtual card, and vice versa. It works as if there were two real memory cards in your system. It's very bizarre to see it work, but it does.

The only downside to this unit is that you cannot see what's on the "virtual" memory cards unless you go into the Memory Card menu. Granted, that's the only way you can see what's on a real memory card, but still – it would have been nice to have the option to see the icons from the V-Mem menu. Loading virtual memory cards is a little on the slow side – about 15 seconds. But the pros more than outweigh the cons.

This device is reportedly much, much more stable than using a third-party multi-page memory card. While I haven't tested it out as stressfully as I want to (yet), I like what I see so far.

The GameShark Pro has the V-Mem built into the device, but only holds eight or so cards in memory. Obviously if you find yourself using a GameShark device during your gaming sessions, this would be the better option since the PlayStation only has one parallel port – and you can only use one device at a time.

And no, the V-Mem doesn't allow you to play import or back-up copies. So if you're using a Game Enhancer device to play non-standard PlayStation games, you'll have to choose between the two. They won't work together.

-- Craig Harris