Ever been annoyed at how expensive PC/Mac controllers are, just to find that when compared to console controllers they come up as cheap and inferior? To get around this, simply modify your Classic X-Box controller to work with your PC/Mac.
This guide provides simple, step-by-step instructions to rewiring your controller that even a beginner can follow. There are two primary aims of this particular tutorial:
- Mod your controller to work with your PC or Mac
- Ensure you aren’t throwing money away and the controller will still work with your X-Box
Note: Please make sure you follow each step closely. It is important because in some areas there are warnings which if overlooked could completely ruin your day.
Heatshrink, USB Extension cable, X-Box controller, USB Extension cable, Cutting tools, Electrical tape.
Cut both ends of the USB extension cable off about 4″ / 10cm from each end.
Remove the outer rubber casing from the cable by cutting it with your smaller blade. Expose approximately 1/2″ – 1″ (1-2cm approx) from the end.
Inside the cable will be some highly annoying shielding to protect the cable, some is silver foil and the other is silver wire. Simply discard of all of this.
Now expose a short piece of wire from the end of each of wire. Be careful, some of the wires are quite fine and will break easily.
Discard the yellow wire from the X-Box Controller, it’s only necessary for some of the X-Box light guns.
Pair your cables up. The FEMALE USB matches up with the X-Box end of the cable and the MALE USB matches up with the controller end.
This is reasonably obvious. The female end of the USB extension cable goes with the X-Box end of the cable. The reason for this is that we want the male end attached to the controller in order to plug it into your PC/Mac.
Cut off approximately 3″ / 7.5cm of heat shrink, enough to cover all of the exposed wire.
Put the heat shrink over the cable BEFORE joining the wires or else you won’t be able to get it on. I made this mistake once and it was highly annoying.
Twist the wires together at the end. Black to black, red to red, green to green and, amazingly enough, white to white.
Place a tiny amount of tape over each of the twisted pairs to ensure that none of the wires can touch each other.
Push your heatshrink down so that it is covering the exposed wire. DO NOT bond the heatshrink until you’ve tested the cables are working.
The male end gets attached to the controller in order to be able to be plugged into the PC/Mac. Repeat steps 9 – 13.
Test your cables. Use the controller with your X-Box/PC/Mac in order to confirm everything is right. On OSX use Xbox HID Driver for Mac OS X and for Windows XP use XBCD.
Finally, blast the heatshrink with a hairdryer or use a cigarette lighter to bond the heatshrink with the exposed pieces. Suddenly you have the final product ready to go.
What you should be left with now is a controller that can work with any and all of your devices. This will save you money on shelling out for expensive PC/Mac controllers, giving you a much better quality gaming experience.
I have tried this controller extensively with several Mac games, several emulators on Mac and various other cool stuff and have had no issues at all.
Disclaimer If you break anything along the way, it is so totally not my fault. I am really sorry if the instructions weren’t simple enough, but I am pretty confident they are and no one should run into any issues.
followed the w00t link here and wondered what you had to say.
you do realise you can just plug in an xbox360 controller into your usb port and it works yeah ? no modding or software required. lets face it, no one wants to use an original xbox controller anymore.
That’s true, but I don’t have any X-Box 360 controllers sitting around so I just went with the Classic X-Box. Also, under Mac you need a $15 piece of software to use the X-Box 360 whereas this way is free.
I have got a problem with your blog correctlly in the most recent release of Opera. Looks fine in Explorer 7 and Firefox though.