36X Controller PCB

[RDC]

This isn't technically a 360 type of hack, it's more like a starting point for other controllers that want to use the 360 controller shell.

I've made a couple of different controllers that use the 360 controller board as the base, the PS360 (PS3 controller in the 360 shell) and PS2x30 (PS2 + PS3 adapter in the 360 shell), and that has always required stripping down all of the components from a stock 360 controller board, and then rewiring it to conform to the new controller's layout.

After toying around with this idea for awhile now, I finally decided I've had enough of that whole process, and if I'm going to make any more of those type of controllers up I wanted a little easier base PCB to work with. Granted designing it up isn't easy, but after it's done, then it's done, and doesn't have to be messed with every time some other controller is made.

I also wanted it to be a bit more versatile than what a stock 360 controller board offers, so that other projects could be done with it as well. For example the PS360 and PS2x30 controllers have different button layouts, as well the PS2x30 sticks power and ground are reversed from the 360 board layout. To that end, all of the buttons, Triggers and such have all been broken out to TP spots, so that it can be wired up for any button configuration much more easily. If I wanted to put a PS3 controller in the 360 shell, it can be wired for that controllers 3 COM line layout, likewise the same board can be used for making up a PS1 controller and using it's common ground button layout, but without having to hack all kinds of different traces up on each one and rewiring it for the controller to be used.

These are some renders of the board as it has progressed..















..and this was a prototype run made at BatchPCB, to see what all still needs changing around and adjusted and such..






I still have a little ways to go on this, but as that version board stands it could be used as everything lines up close enough. That's not good enough for me though, so I'll have to run it thru a few more revision changes before I'm content to use it in anything. I'm also still undecided on the D-pad contacts, but they both work the same and it's short comings are the mechanical side of it, so neither one is any better there than the other there.

[hyper999]

That is just sooo cool!

[3D0kassiah]

you gonna sell these by chance ?

[RDC]

I hadn't seriously considered it, though if enough people were interested and I get it to a place that I'm content with it (I'm right picky most times) then they could be. Since I'm the only one working on and investing in them right now it's just a side project for the most part, but also something to make some of the controllers I do easier if anyone wants one made up.

They wouldn't be dirt cheap either, but that mainly depends on how many people were interested. Having a just 1 of these made up costs around $50 as it is there, and that's done at a place that doesn't do any internal routing, which are cutouts done inside the board, like the square holes for the Trigger assemblies, so that has to be done afterwards with a Dremel, or the whole deal done at another PCB fabrication house that would charge more per board to do it on a machine.

If enough of them are ordered up at some place the cost would go down, the same as anything else, but this one is still a couple bills away from being done with prototyping until I'd be comfortable placing a large order someplace for them.

[3D0kassiah]

im sure you can get people on board

[Anonamous]

They wouldn't be dirt cheap either, but that mainly depends on how many people were interested. Having a just 1 of these made up costs around $50 as it is there, and that's done at a place that doesn't do any internal routing, which are cutouts done inside the board, like the square holes for the Trigger assemblies, so that has to be done afterwards with a Dremel, or the whole deal done at another PCB fabrication house that would charge more per board to do it on a machine.

The labor required to do it yourself it may be much, but it would also be much cheaper.

Also, are you going to release board file for this that could be used in eagle or DipTrace or other cad programs?

[RDC]

Sorry, but I've no plans to release the Gerber files at this time, as that's on par with releasing source code for us hardware guys, since all the work went into making them.

If you'd like to make your own homemade dual sided boards, drill all of the holes in the correct spots, then hand plate all of the Vias or put wires in them and then cut the thing out so it fits right, well, I'm not going to stop you, but I'm not jumping on that band wagon either. It's not any kind of money saver at all when the time to do all of that is factored in, and you still end up with a board that's nowhere near as nice as one made at a fab house. You also wouldn't need the Gerber files to do it that way either, just a couple of .jpg or .pdf files of the board traces/outline.

[Anonamous]

Sorry, but I've no plans to release the Gerber files at this time, as that's on par with releasing source code for us hardware guys, since all the work went into making them.

If you'd like to make your own homemade dual sided boards, drill all of the holes in the correct spots, then hand plate all of the Vias or put wires in them and then cut the thing out so it fits right, well, I'm not going to stop you, but I'm not jumping on that band wagon either. It's not any kind of money saver at all when the time to do all of that is factored in, and you still end up with a board that's nowhere near as nice as one made at a fab house. You also wouldn't need the Gerber files to do it that way either, just a couple of .jpg or .pdf files of the board traces/outline.

ok I just figured I would ask. I am not looked to do exactly what you are doing. What I am trying to do is get a layout similar to the Intensafire how it sits over the controller board and over the player indicator led's and such. This way I could do this without all the wires and mess.

[RDC]

Making an LED board wouldn't be very hard, but the thickness of it's going to cause issues there and then you'd still have a mess of wires to deal with. The best way to go about that would be to make it with a Flex board, like the Intensafire or Viking one, but that entire thing (components installed) would have to be made up by some company since soldering on those things after the fact ends up in them melting 99% of the time.

Making it so it has to be connected to the original LED lines is needed so the player indication will work, but it also limits it to one version controller or the other, Matrix or CG, as they each drive their LEDs in a different way, unless that's been taken care of in your code. The Matrix LEDs are in a Common Anode layout and so are driven with negative pulses, while the CG controllers are in a Common Cathode layout and driven with a positive voltage. That will also influence the Flex board design as well, since they each have components in different locations.

[Anonamous]

Making an LED board wouldn't be very hard, but the thickness of it's going to cause issues there and then you'd still have a mess of wires to deal with. The best way to go about that would be to make it with a Flex board, like the Intensafire or Viking one, but that entire thing (components installed) would have to be made up by some company since soldering on those things after the fact ends up in them melting 99% of the time.

Making it so it has to be connected to the original LED lines is needed so the player indication will work, but it also limits it to one version controller or the other, Matrix or CG, as they each drive their LEDs in a different way, unless that's been taken care of in your code. The Matrix LEDs are in a Common Anode layout and so are driven with negative pulses, while the CG controllers are in a Common Cathode layout and driven with a positive voltage. That will also influence the Flex board design as well, since they each have components in different locations.

hmm... I didn't know that matrix uses negative pulses. I also planned on doing a flex board. It has been something I have tried to do, stopped, put it off a bit, then months later come back etc.

[Hazer]

They wouldn't be dirt cheap either, but that mainly depends on how many people were interested. Having a just 1 of these made up costs around $50 as it is there, and that's done at a place that doesn't do any internal routing, which are cutouts done inside the board, like the square holes for the Trigger assemblies, so that has to be done afterwards with a Dremel, or the whole deal done at another PCB fabrication house that would charge more per board to do it on a machine.

Try getting a quote here:  http://www.pcbcart.com/cart.php?target=profile&mode=login

You will have to create an account, but its easy and they dont spam you (personal experience). I would be very surprised if they charged more than $10 a board even for quantities less than 100.

[RDC]

Interesting site, but their $75 one time Tooling cost for a few boards to see how good they turn out is pretty unappealing. I see no exact specs on their routing capabilities either. Have you had any board designs that weren't square/rectangle made by them? and if so how well did they turn out?

I seriously doubt anyone is interested in having to cut out their boards, I know I'm not, or I could get them made up fairly cheap at any number of places.

If I knew they did complex board shapes, then it looks like a good place to get a bunch of finals done up, but dropping that $75 Tooling charge on a few boards to see how they might turn out just kills it.

[hyper999]

How about using a cleverly sized through hole pad to get round the internal routing rule? Perhaps something like this would work?

[RDC]

A hole has to be, well, a hole, round. Anything else is a route or slot. Making it a hole would make it too large for the part that has to fit in there. I could have the thing just drilled 6 or so times, the 4 corners and along the edges, making it less material to remove. That's the 'typical' way of getting around internal cutouts, but the 2 spots that need it are pretty small and wouldn't be a big deal to have to do by hand after the boards are made up.

[hyper999]

A hole has to be, well, a hole, round. Anything else is a route or slot. Making it a hole would make it too large for the part that has to fit in there. I could have the thing just drilled 6 or so times, the 4 corners and along the edges, making it less material to remove. That's the 'typical' way of getting around internal cutouts, but the 2 spots that need it are pretty small and wouldn't be a big deal to have to do by hand after the boards are made up.

Yes what I mean is would a hole with a diameter the same as the distance between the two diagonally opposite corners of the rectangle you wanted provide a good enough fit instead of the original rectangle and save you having to dremel anything.

[RDC]

Would it work? probably, but I'd prefer to not use that method as it takes away a good bit from how well the Trigger assemblies mount, and the more abuse they can't take, the more that gets transferred to the solder joints for the POT, so they could fail sooner.

Real world it might not make much difference either way though, I'll give it a go on the next version I have made up to see how well that may work out though, since they're not being routed on the test boards now anyway.

[RDC]

OK, have a few of these made up now. Not quite the finals yet, but this will be the last ones made before them. These only have the AA spots missing and the D-pad contacts are mixed, since I still wasn't decided on which ones to go with yet, though neither one is better than the other, so it doesn't affect anything being like it is.

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If anyone would like to give one a go PM me, I have a little over 10 of these for testing. I'm asking $10 each on these shipped ($15 outside the US) to keep this and similar projects going, finals should be around $20 each if anyone is interested.

[Phantom]

those are sweet RDC, nice work man

[Rodent]

Very impressive. I have to agree with phantomz0 , Except its AWESOME WORK , not just nice work

[Modded Matt]

ill take one. pm sent

[Rodent]

ill take one. pm sent

i beat you to it

[RDC]

Thanks guys.

PMs replied to.

Have 10 right now, so more than a few left to go around.

[Rodent]

I will purchase a few more when you get more made! thanks RDC .

[rafaliyo86]

Wow, Really I dont know how you can do thing like this guys. I will purchase one soon (if you send to Spain)

[Modded Matt]

she is sending the money now. with shipping info in the notes.

[RDC]

Packages shipped and PMs sent, Thanks guys.

Like to see what you all make up with them. The one I have wired up right now is just a test bed really and is connected to a 16F690, then it goes to a couple of N64 controllers. The PIC is to change the Analog voltage style sticks that most controllers use now, to have Gray code outputs so the N64 controllers can work off them, also to change the Triggers from an Analog signal to a Digital one for the Z buttons. It's just for games that support dual sticks, 007 Golden Eye, Perfect Dark and a couple others. It was mentioned to me as an idea, so I tinkered around on it some. The final of it will all be made up on it's own board, both N64 controllers stripped for the main components and then the PIC, and then it'll either be wired to a 36X, or just outright made in the 360 board layout on it's own depending on how much room it takes up, or I may never finish it now that I know the core of it works and the hard part is done, still a LOT to do on it with the Memory and Rumble yet if I do.




Craptastic video of the Triggers doing the Analog to Digital thing, making an LED turn on for each one when pressed, which will be replaced by the Z button lines on the controllers next. The row of 8 Red LEDs are the Encoder outputs from the PIC, 2 per axis, 4 for each controller. They were used during early coding/testing, just haven't bothered to remove them yet. You can see them flicker some when the controller is messed with, which is from the sticks moving a little and the PIC converting those Analog voltage changes to the Gray code the N64 controllers use for the sticks, which was harder than I liked, least for me, but I'm not a coder.

https://www.acidmods.com/RDC/NINTENDO/N64/N128%20002.mov

[Rodent]

Recieved mine today Thanks RDC awesome work also.

[rafaliyo86]

I have a noob question, what components wOuld i need apart of sticks and triggers??

[RDC]

I can't answer exactly what you'll need or not, it wasn't made for that, it's design is to do whatever you want with it, so it mainly depends on what you're wanting or trying to do.

[3D0kassiah]

sent payment today cant wait to see what everyones uses this
  rdc for the dev of the board 

[Modded Matt]

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2

[rafaliyo86]

I can't answer exactly what you'll need or not, it wasn't made for that, it's design is to do whatever you want with it, so it mainly depends on what you're wanting or trying to do.

If I would use it like a normal controller??

[Rodent]

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2

I received mine same time... Make sure you give him Trade Count   

[RDC]

If I would use it like a normal controller??

I don't know if you're getting what this was designed for or not, but it can't be used like a 'normal controller' because it's not a controller at all, it's just a blank slate for you to do whatever you want with inside the 360 shell and layout.

Say you want to put an SNES controller into the 360 shell, I don't know why, but say you do. You'd use this board and wire up it's button contacts to the spots on the SNES board that you wanted them to be. D-pad to the D-pad, L to LB, Start to Start and so on. In that case, you don't really need the Sticks, Headset and other connectors, no Triggers either for that matter in that layout.

Now if you're wanting to put a PS3 controller in the 360 shell, then you'll need the Triggers, PnC charge and Headset connectors, then for the Sticks it really depends on the version of PS3 controller used if they can be the 360 style or have to be the PS3 style.


The 36X board is really just that, a board. It's not a solder up a few parts, drop in the controller and play on the 360 kind of thing. It's a blank slate to do whatever you want while staying in the 360 controller shell, without having to strip down an existing 360 controller board to use it for the button contacts, which is far more work and might be in a button layout that you're new project controller isn't in.

So again, I can't tell you what you'll need or not, unless I know exactly what you're wanting to do.

[RDC]

Kind of a related topic, the work on the DuXe PCB is in the prototype stage right now.

https://www.acidmods.com/forum/index.php/topic,41960.0.html