When the PS2 is booting up, holding Triangle + R1 opens the uLaunchELF as normal.
Is there a PlayStation 2 emulator PCSX2 is a free and open-source PlayStation 2 emulator for Windows, Linux, and macOS that supports a wide range of PlayStation 2 video games with a high level of compatibility and functionality. Yesterday I successfully installed FMCB v1.8 on my PS2 Slim (SCPH-90004) (Matrix Infinity v1.93) and don't how to boot in the FMCB menu.
The other option is find a mate with a modded machine and use that to make your McBoot memory card. Free McBoot is Free Memory Card Boot, a PlayStation 2 softmod allowing you to run unsigned code and unofficial programs. You could do this using the Independence Exploit (though this won't work on slim PS2s). However since it's now freely available for normal memory cards the snag is that you need a way of running unsigned code just to launch the installer on a PS2. How do you install free McBoot on ps2 Although a PS2 slim is required to do this, after the Free McBoot application is installed, the memory card can. The exploit is a bit tricky in that the executable must be signed with the individual memory card's key (MagicGate) - so until recently you could only do this on one of those third party Memor32 memory cards that hooked up to the PC via USB. It's in beta testing so it won't be long and it ought to allow ripping to HD and the use of PS2 memory cards. There is a bloke working on a PSX emulator for PS2 (rather than running in BC mode). Note: It is easier to start the Linux Live DVD and extract the baseimage from the DVD. The emulators aren't great sadly, and lack the finish of the Xbox or PSP ones. Memory card exploit Free McBoot (working with old slim PSTwo) Download vmlinux and initrd files. It supports FAT32 USB Mass Storage, and Windows shares over LAN, so it ought to breathe a bit of life into old forgotten consoles: The other bonus is that nowadays the PS2 has a decent DivX/Xvid player called SMS (Simple Media System). Updated to build with the new PS2SDK, for stability. The FMCB version number can now be accessed through the VER variable in FREEMCB.CNF, for the top and bottom delimiters. All you need is a Network Adapter and a spare IDE hard disk. Free Memory Card Boot (FMCB): Changelog for v1.95: Fixed alpha blending for the hacked OSD. The really good news is that if you have an old chubby PS2, you can install HD Loader. There is an elaborate way of reburning patched ISOs in DVD-Video mode that allows yarring but I haven't tried that. In summary you can now run unsigned code on an unmodded machine - BUT you still can't fool the disc validity checking.
Not sure if anyone's noticed already but it seems that a few months ago someone found a way of exploiting the fact that the PS2 firmware looks for a DVDPlayer update on the memory card at boot time.