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There are several ways to get into the scene:
This is a special black playstation that can be purchased from Sony. It comes with a special boot CD, a special memory card, a serial cable, and a compiler/libraries for your PC. The idea is that you start your Yaroze with the boot CD, and (assuming it finds the memory card) it will then communicate with the PC via the serial cable. The PC can compile playstation code and send it down the serial cable to run it.
This limits you to creating software that will run entirely in the playstations memory as (AIUI) there is no easy way to make CDs with software/data on or to read from them.
This is an expensive way for many to try stuff out, as most people interested in trying their hand at coding already have a perfectly good Playstation. Not only that, but the compiler you are given is basically gcc, the excellent free compiler from the FSF. And furthermore many people, myself included, consider the licensing terms you have to sign with Sony to be ridiculously biased in their favour.
The original homebrew solution to PSX programming was to get an Action Replay card for your playstation, and the comms kit to connect it to your PC. Then, by downloading the alternative 'Caetla' ROM for it and flashing it into its memory you effectively have your own Yaroze. All that remains is to get hold of a compiler and some libraries.
This is a cheaper method in terms of the hardware involved; it uses your current playstation, but does rely on you having a PC with a spare ISA slot for the comms kit to use. IIRC there are schematics on the web for an interface that you can build that allows the Action Replay to be communicated with from a standard parallel port, but I can't remember where I saw this.
You still need to get your own compiler and libraries though.
The final method is to get an Xplorer cartridge (called Xploder in the states, and probably other things elsewhere). Not only is this cheaper than the Action Replay (sub 20 quid if you look for it) it can communicate with your PC via an ordinary parallel lead as standard. The software to do this is available for free download on the xplorer website.
The Xplorer does everything the standard Action Replay does, and more. It doesn't quite match the Caetla ROM in terms of functionality apparently, but its being improved all the time. This won hands down for me as (a) I didn't have a free ISA slot, and (b) I was given one!
Again you are still left without a compiler and libraries though, but this can be solved...
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