Yeah it was me.

I wouldn't call this a 100% complete mod as of yet, right now it's just tacked in place so it's not as solid as it will be when completed, but it is 100% working right now. This was done on the newer CG version of Wireless controller as well, so if ya have any aspirations of attempting this and have an older Matrix controller you're out of luck going about it this way because of it's trace layout for the D-pad.

It actually wasn't quite as bad as I thought it might be, only took a few hours really, though I don't recommend it for just anyone to go out and try.

Here's the 360 shell with the section of D-pad shell from the PS3 controller installed as a test fit. Notice the huge and nasty looking gaps? This is a test controller, you'll survive.




After that go in the actual D-pad components...




...then the rubber pad. It had to be trimmed down to fit properly.




Now instead of opting to use Tact switches, build my own board or some other PITA setup I went ahead and tried using the existing daughter board from the PS3 controller, which is really a PITA all on it's own and if anyone has had the pleasure of tearing apart a PS2/3 controller knows it's nothing you're typically used to when messing with a controller's button contacts and is near impossible to alter in any way. This ended up working just fine after a slight modification (cutting the traces) as the PS3 button layout is far different from how the 360 works. Then in went a plastic disc (courtesy of a DVD case and the Dremel) and some hot glue to have a nice backing for the D-pad so it would work when pushed.



A little bit of foam padding to keep the thing from being pushed thru the incredible void that was the original 360 D-pad, again this is a test controller though something similar would be used anyway here...




...and finally the finished controller and close ups of the PS3 D-pad installed.

I've been waiting to see that for a long time.. And, I always figured you would be the one to do it..

Congrats on an awesome mod!!!

WOW. Very slick. I Like this a lot. You didnt have to do much with the original 360 controllers board I bet either. Very nice RDC. This is very nice.

that is by far the best thing that could happen to a 360 controller, i'd like to try that myself, know where i could pick up a broken ps3 controller for cheap? maybe ebay

As long as ya have the CG version Wireless board (or CL version Wired one) ya don't have to do anything really to the board at all except solder on 5 wires. On the CG Wireless one you'll have to scrape down 3 Vias to solder wires to for Up, Down and Left, but Right has a nice TP spot to hit as does Ground. On the CL Wired board everything has a TP spot to hit. The majority of the work has to be done to the shell so everything fits just right.




Broken PS3 controllers on eBay are about half what a new one costs and who knows what would be wrong with it, might even be missing the parts that ya need. Either get a used one or just spring for a new one, then ya can try to make a PS360 controller or PS3 arcade stick or something completely new with the leftovers.


NOTE: Again, anyone going to attempt this needs to make SURE you have the CG version of Wireless board or CL version of Wired one. With the older 'Matrix' style Wired and Wireless controllers this will NOT work on them because of how those boards are setup. Technically it could still be done on them, but not this exact way as the PS3 daughter board is a common line, so ya need to either have the CG or CL board for it to work with it this way.


Here is a black one I also did a little while ago, looks a lot nicer as I took some extra time fitting the D-pad in this one, that first one was just a hack job to see if it would fly, it did so from now on it's all form since the function is taken care of. Might have to get a hold of one of the White PS3 controllers to do up a white shell properly one day too.

So it works better? Also, slap the buttons from your ps360 controller in there and that would look SICK!

http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f320/RDC...60/PS360026.jpg

You're a bad ass RDC.

But really, I don't use the D pad so...I mean it really isn't the most useful mod, but it looks amazing asthetically. And if you use the D pad then it is good for you. All I use the D pad for is calling in UAVs, Air Strikes, and Helicopter.

Makes me cry when im in my 10th prestige and i still havent seen a heli in SnD
But i have airstriked my own team

Much better than the retch of a 360 D-pad that was in there before. I'll be redoing the D-pad on the PS360 controller sooner or later, but this is just a straight up 360 controller with the D-pad replaced.


Thanks.

If ya played even one game that actually needed it to be accurate even 2 times in a row you'd have a way different opinion of it as far as usefulness goes. Most games are geared toward using the analog sticks and the D-pad is for minor things mostly if really even needed at all, but when ya get into playing something that actually is heavy on using it, Live Arcade games or some fighting games, then ya find out how bad it really is.

O yes I know exactly what you are talking about and it is pretty shit. Just I don't use it. And I am not going to buy a PS3 controller just to upgrade the D pad.

Too bad, it's actually one of the better uses for it.

They really suck that bad?

If ya mean the PS3 controllers, not really, that's called humor, but in a 360 forum it just fits much better. If ya mean the D-pad on the 360 controller I'm not much fond of it personally, but it's not a deal breaker for the controller, some games yes because needing a good D-pad is essential, but not the controller overall.

Really depends on your controller preference though. There are plenty who would agree a PS3 controller sacrificing it's D-pad for a 360 controller is the only useful thing it ever did, while there are others that would loath to see a PS3 D-pad on a 360 controller and can't stand the feel of it at all.

I really neither praise or despise any particular controller setup, because if something isn't right I either change it, try to change it or just don't use it. The D-pad on the 360 is the reason I stopped playing DOA4 though and I have a friend that uses the D-pad heavily in THPS games and I fixed that controller a couple of times from it going sailing across the room because of the D-pad issues the 360 controller has.

Hats off to you my friend, I definitiley like the look, though I'm gonna admit I'm not gonna try it myself Controllers aren't my strong point

looks great. It'll be a lot better than the 360 Dpad

sweet mod, that is the one thing that bothers me about the controller.

I wanted an air strike not nightvision...damn d pad

awesome! i've been waiting for someone to do this, as i dont have the skills myself. i've always hated the 360 dpad, and the PS dpad has always been great.

you,sir, have just made the best controller ever.

Thanks all. I had a friend use the thing a little bit to play some SF and MK and he said it's worth it in MK just to be able to jump in game when ya want to, the 360 D-pad is just so fickle sometimes it makes those kind of games just unbearable.

The black controller will be going off to a pretty hardcore DOA4 player for his take on it, so it'll be getting tested out pretty good here before long on a more modern game that uses the D-pad a lot.

Very impressive work RDC, you've got some mad skills.

Just wondered if you've tried replacing the 360 d-pad with one from an original xbox duke controller. I've heard it is a straight replacement and solves any directional problems.

I have a spare duke lying around but don't really want to strip two controllers down, incase what I've heard is crap.

The Duke D-pad is massive by comparison, whoever ya heard that from was severely mistaken or you're confusing it with the S-controller D-pad. The S controller D-pad is a direct replacement, but as to is solving any real issues, aside from people thinking it works better, just isn't the case. The S-controller D-pad and 360 D-pad physically are the exact same aside from color and the 360 one having an extra alignment tab that would need to be ct off to install it in an S-controller and it serves no purpose at all anyway, so swapping one for the other on either controller isn't really doing a thing for the controller but changing the color of it's D-pad.

Yeah I suspected it was a load of bull. I was referring to the duke (big) controller, but haven't set eyes on one in about a year, so I didn't know there was a massive size difference.

Thanks for clearing things up mate.

hi rdc

Can you make a wiring diagram on where to connect the wires to the 360 motherboard, becausee the dpad on the 360 is so anoyying. As soon as i saw this I knew i had to do this mod. Oh and by the way can you use a ps2 controller??

Thanks

Nothing gets connected to the 360 motherboard, but on the controller's board yeah it does. It's 5 wires and all of the buttons, including the D-pad traces, are shown in the Wireless CG version thread. It's in the Pinned section, Tutorials under the Controllers subsection. You'll have to solder 3 to Vias (Down, Left and Up) and 2 to TP spots (Right and Ground). The controller has to be the Wireless CG version also (or the Wired CL one) so make sure of that first, that info is also in the same thread, post #20 shows how to tell if it's a CG controller or not without having to tear it all apart. For the Wired CL one you'd have to take it apart to tell.

As far as using a PS2 for the parts, I don't see why not. Probably have a few slight differences ya may have to deal with, but I see no reason it couldn't be used instead, just remember to sever the carbon film trace at the contact so that it's an open circuit instead of a Resistor like it is normally. Just use an X-acto knife or something with a sharp tip and scratch it a few times, doesn't take much to get a nice thin line cut thru it to open the thing up, refer to the 4th picture to see what I mean.

Just in case anyone was wondering (and someone was) what the PS3 D-pad looks like in a Pink controller (also with black thumb stick caps), here it is.





I'm considering doing this on a couple of Halo 3 controllers as well, not the Green ones but the ones with the artwork on them by Todd McFarlane & Greg Capullo, but I think leaving the Spartan one a 360 controller like it is and making the Brute one a PS360 controller for use on the PS3 would be much more fitting.

Will this work with the guts of a PS2 control?

lol you never cease to amazing me RDC! You've now inspired me to try this!

(p.s.- I dont know if you remember me, but I'm the guy who you sent those 4 tact switches to back in '07 for me to try and add buttons to the bottom of my controller.)

Yes and no. The newer PS2 controllers are redesigned so much that using them is pretty much right out, they have the pads inverted, really funky, so those are right out. You could probably do it with an older PS2 controller though for sure, but Sony goes thru so many revisions of their boards and setups that I'd have to see it to know for sure.


Thanks, but watch out for the newer PS3 controllers, they don't have the connector on the daughter board anymore and that version of controller also makes doing this impossible. Get ya an older Six-Axis one to be sure ya have one with the right 'guts' in the thing.


I'm also looking into having some boards made up for the internal electrical part of this as well, that way it will work on the Matrix as well as CG/CL versions of boards, right now ya have to have a CG or CL version and using that PS3 daughter board is just a real PITA.

This is how you do it... man this thread is a few month old... I need to hang around the hardware forums more often

nice work I might try doing this myself.

I thought about doing this with a gamecube or PS1 pad dozens of times. I figure the PCB based pads could just be Dremeled and soldered to... though the membrane based PS3 pad looks fairly easy to work with.

again, nice work

I also did a NES one awhile back as well. Have a look in my Sig for any other controller messing around ya may have missed too.

http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=655743


That PS3 daughter board is a witch to screw with, ya have to cut it as small as ya can and it still doesn't fit, so the inside of the controller has to be cut into, then ya have to sever the carbon traces at the very center where the pad contacts will hit them, leaving them like they are doesn't work since they're basically ~8k Resistors and the circuit needs to be open to work with the CG board, then ya have to use some double sided tape to keep the thing from moving around and attached to a backing plate to simulate the PS3 insides as well as a spacer between the backing plate and controller's board.

That thing is a real pain to work with and that's one of the reasons why I'm looking into just having some contact boards made up instead of having to mess with that thing, it'll just make the whole ordeal a chore instead of a chore that has several places that ya can screw the whole thing up and get rid of the nerve racking that goes along with it even if ya know what you're doing. Plus being able to use it on the Matrix version board will open it up to being done on a lot more controllers that are already out there. Ya can't do that now with the PS3 daughter board since it's a 'sort of common ground' setup, but a custom board can be setup to work with either 360 controller layout. Another thing is reliability, I've had one of these tested by a hardcore DOA4 player for a couple months and when it finally started acting up (he plays for hours a day and at tournaments) I didn't care much for what I saw inside it in terms of wear and tear on the daughter board contacts, since it wasn't really designed for this it takes a real beating, as well it's really picky to line up and get it just right, then when ya do it has to stand up to a thrashing, which in most cases makes it shift slightly and screws something up, so it's as close to crap doing it this way as I could probably get, but when it's done right and all together properly it's night and day by comparison to the 360 D-pad.

Hey RDC, I've recently gotten myself a PS3 and was looking into modding the 360 controller as you have.
Anyway, you're saying that the DS3 controllers will not work with this mod.
Is there a way to put the rumble on sixaxis controllers?
I was hoping to get everything into one controller ds3 with d-pad transferred onto a 360 controller.

Afraid not, the older Six-Axis are just that, they weren't designed for Rumble at all.

What you're attempting sounds more like you're making a PS360 controller plus this D-pad swap, this one is just a 360 controller that has the PS3 D-pad is all.

The deal with the DS3 controllers is the newer ones (there are 2 versions of them that I know of, more HERE) don't have the connector for the daughter board anymore, the earlier versions of the DS3 do though. It could still be done if ya ended up with the newer DS3 controller and wanted to tear into an older Six-Axis and use it's daughter board and connector though.

Wow, seems like I'm a little over my head right now.
I'll need to get all my materials first before I start cracking cases up.
Anyway, have you gotten the pressure-sensitivity into your PS360 controller?
BTW that mod was pretty sick... have you made more since your last WIP?
Sorry if I have a shitload of questions but I'm a late-comer to all this PS3 stuff.

Best to ask/leave all that in the PS360 thread.

Just wondering 4 buttons, but 5 wires what is the extra one for ?

It holds the fabric of space and time together, without it, who could say what would happen or it's the common ground for all of the buttons, I get those confused.

If there were only 4 wires for 4 buttons there couldn't be any kind of change in their state when they were pushed because there wouldn't be anything for them to connect to.

True in a Matrix setup you can get 4 buttons from 4 wires, but the Matrix controllers D-pad needs 7 because of how it's setup with other buttons in the controller and the PS3 D-pad is already a common line type setup (it technically has 3 different common lines) so it has to be used with the CG or CL versions of 360 controller.

hey RDC, love your work, read all the posts. is there any chance of you posting something about your methods used to cut that lovely looking "hole" in the 360 controller and how you get the d-pad housing out of the PS controller, trying yo get mine to look like your black one, not the pink one (it look's like a photoshop job LOL). All for Street Fighter IV. THANKS

Thanks, much appreciated.

That Pink controller belongs to Kasmi Chan, and I did a custom one for Silent Legend as well. On her controller I just used a Dremel, buttons from a Black controller, Headset connector from an old GH X-plorer and some black paint on the tail piece, no PS magic going on there.

Ya can use whatever kind of cutting disc/blade ya want to hack out the PS3 D-pad section, just rough cut it out, then use a Cutter/Burr type of bit to make the opening in the controller bigger as well as trim down the PS3 D-pad. I couldn't guarantee ya your first one will be pretty, mine wasn't and the pics on page 1 show it, but it was just a real quick and dirty test controller. Every other one looks better as I took more time on it and have a better 'feel' for how it goes, plus using a Black 360 shell helps mask the minor little flaws in it. The only way you'd get them cut perfectly is to use a CNC machine.

Hey, thanks for linking me here

I was wondering what that black connection was that all the wires (and it looks like the daughter board) connect to? I assume those wires go to the corresponding spots on the xbox dpad mobo spot.

It's just part of the original Daughter board connector form the PS3 controller and yes those 5 wires run to the D-pad connections on the controller board.

Great job.

come to me, my sweet 36D!!!


how well does the dpad work in comparison, RDC?

You'll know in another day or so when your controller shows up, then ya can tell me how it is.

IT IS TRULY A MIRACLE.

i have the perfect controller! the dpad is so much more responsive. the movement is fluid, and picking weapons in gears2 is no longer a lottery. arcade games are much easier to play as well.

its so nice i wish all my controller were like this!

my friends are all bugging me now where to get one. lol!

@RDC:

Could you please tell me where you soldered the wires on the pcb? I have done this mod too, but the buttons doesn't work for me

Have you got a CG controller? It will only work with a CG board (thats why mine isnt finished)
Then you solder the blue wire to button ground (the one all the D-pad buttons share) and then solder the other 4 wires to the button direction it is (up, down, left, right)

Good luck!

Ok, i found now the points... But it still doesn't work, so what did you exactly in th 4th picture? You said something about scratching, but my english isn't tooo good, so could you please explain me what to to exactly?

Ok,
sorry about my rubbish paint skills (it was quick)

Here is where you connect to the board the blue wire to any spot and the 4 white wires one to each:


Here is a what wire should go to where:


Pictures are stolen from RDC
Hope that helps

Make shure that the Blue trace on the PS3 board is intact.

Ya have to be using either the CG (Wireless) or CL (Wired) version of 360 controller, and the spots I use on the CG are on the back of the board.

Make sure you've severed the contacts on the PS3 board also, if you haven't done that all you've done is wired up 4 Resistors in there and it's not going to work right either, they need to be opened up and that can be seen in the previous pics.

TP9 is D-pad Right

TP2 or TP22 for Ground

D-pad Up, Left and Down ya have to hit a Via for those connections and info on how to prepare and attach a wire to a Via are in the Tutorials section in the Trace Repair thread also.

[quote name='RDC' date='Jan 16 2009, 04:01 AM' post='4417173']
It holds the fabric of space and time together, without it, who could say what would happen or it's the common ground for all of the buttons, I get those confused.

LOL!!!!!!!!
That was great and this mod is sick been wanting to this myself just hadn't convince myself to break PS3 controller on a whim but since you put this nice tut up I'm already picking out which controller. Much respect you rock!

Make sure it's an older version of PS3 controller, straight SixAxis if possible, as the newer ones do not have the Daughter board connector in them, they use a different setup and can't be used for this.

http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=648322

You can still use the shell and D-pad parts from a newer version DS3 if ya have to have the shell part be black, but only the older one has the connector/board that ya need, so best to go with a straight SixAxis to make sure ya have all the right parts.