There are some (usually small and single owner) 
places that will still put in mod chips for 
people here in the US. If video games are your 
thing, all you really need to do is find an 
import video game store and near ALL of those 
places will quietly install them. Private people 
with the skills also offer up their services here 
and there on the Internet to mod things.

But it's still illegal, and Sony (especially) was 
and has been taking steps to make mod chips in 
the PSX useless. They came up with games that 
detect the chips and won't run if a chip is 
present. They also made the "new" PSX1 console 
case so small, installing the (then only) existing
PSX mod chip would cause the system to overheat. 
Also, five years(?) ago, they were (obviously 
with police backup) pulling sting operations on 
places that installed the chips and confiscating 
the consoles involved. That was the whole reason 
we had my best friend install our chip in the 
first place -- we couldn't be assured we would 
get our machine back if we gave it to someone to 
be modded.

I haven't heard of confiscations happening since, 
and don't know what the end result of the first 
round of them was, but mod chips are still not 
legal, and you want to be careful who you tell 
about it. Many will look the other way, but you 
could lose your console to the one jerk who 
doesn't, and reports you. Bascally, once our 
modded consoles die, my husband and I don't try 
to have them repaired. We let them die in favor 
of the lesser risk of just modding another.

Keep in mind, this is all US-related info. I 
don't know how it's treated in Europe, further 
than I'm pretty sure I was told it's illegal 
there too.

Many Sharp Smiles,
--Drac