I found http://mod-chip.com/ to be very helpful; they have documents and video explaining how to install chips (or if it doesn’t require any install, it shows you how to use it.)

For…strict personal backups obviously…

I have a modchip and they are dead annoying imho. i love them for getting games from the orient etc but making them is a right pain in the swizz.

If you dont have a silver ps2 make sure your computer can write dvd-rs as thats all they read also familiarise yourself with nero and dveolop a lot of paitence.