Hello again Toodles. I recently hacked a 360 PCB for use with the UPCB, as per the instructable (same madcatz controller and all). I’m sure you can surmise that I’m having a problem getting it working. Specifically, what’s happening is this:
I plug in controller to 360 while holding Fierce and Roundhouse.
Nothing happens.
If I move the stick and push buttons, the P1 LED lights up with varying brightness, but nothing else happens.
I’ve tested for shorts, and GND to VCC gives a steadily increasing resistance, and D+/D- to GND give resistance in the 1500k ohm range.
Is this resistance normal?
Are there any areas on the madcatz controller I should look over specifically? Maybe one area that is particularly notorious for a botched connection?
After some testing, I think the 360 board is fine. I connected the USB cable I pulled from it to the corresponding points on the IDC connector and it shows up on my laptop as a 360 controller. If I try to do it through the UPCB by holding fierce and roundhouse though, nothing happens.
I finally got around to putting my PCBs together. The first one took forever, but it’s working fine. The second one is giving me strange issues. I did all my tests with my multimeter and it seemed fine.
At first it registered ok, however, “Up” was stuck on and it would stay that way intermittenly. Eventually it would get unstuck, but hitting “Right” would cause it to register “Up-Right”.
So, I took it apart, rechecked all my solder points, redid anything that looked bad. Tried again, got an error message saying that there was a problem. Reconnected my working UPCB to make sure the cables/stick weren’t the issue, that worked fine, then retried. Still didn’t work. After waiting about half an hour or so, i decided to try again…and it worked! I was excited, however, today, I try it again, and guess what? No go.
I have no idea what could cause this sort of intermitten problem. Any ideas? The only thing I notice different is that the 470nF cap that was included in this kit says 470L. Could this be a problem?
Meh, found it, it looks like one of the resistors just doesn’t want to stay put. Any slight pressure and it moves out of contact. I could’ve sworn I did that one ok, but I guess not. I may just have to remove it and then resolder again…
I don’t know for certain what the resistances between D+ and D- to ground should be. The resistance on the madcatz pad between VCC and ground should be around 2.5k because of the four 10k potentiometers on the analog sticks (possibly 1.666k if you left the trigger pots on, but its probably best if you remove those).
The very first place I’d look is to check the orientation of the 4066N chip on the UPCB itself. I know its the one you got from me, but I do make mistakes. The notch should be on the edge of the board just like the notch on the PIC. Next, just because you mentioned the resistance for both D+ and D-, I’d check the resistance between those two lines; if they both show 1.5k resistance to ground, there should be 3k resistance between D+ and D-; if there is 0 resistance, that’s definitely a problem, so check both with it connected to the UPCB and disconnected, so you can narrow down if the short between them is on the pad or the UPCB.
With the pad connected to the UPCB, check the resistance between a VCC point on the pad, like one of the outside pins of an analog stick and the VCC_TEST point on the UPCB. Repeat for ground and the GND_TEST.
Once the UPCB is plugged in with a USB cable and the fierce and roundhouse buttons connected, it should stay in the piggyback mode until power is killed. Attach the black probe of your multimeter to the GND_TEST point, set the multimeter to voltage, and plug the stick into a PC with fierce and roundhouse pressed. Check the voltage on pin 6 and pin 12 of the 4066N chip to verify they are at 5v or there abouts (anything above 4v is good). If so, then the PIC is detecting the button select cable just fine, seeing the pressed buttons, and gone into piggyback mode.
Let me know how that goes and we’ll go from there.
I’ve never put anything like this together, and the instructables on putting this together throws my head for a loop. I can, all be it barely wrap my head around Pad hacking,But the assembly on this board seems to be lost on me.
Is there any way to get my hands on one of these bad boys pre-assembled, or should I just hook my Joystick up 360 only now and wait for Cthulhu 2? (for GC, PS2 Support)
Edit, never mind, I’ll do thi the old fashon way (duel PCBing a PSX controller and using a Joybox)
I guarantee you don’t know any less about this stuff than I do, and I managed to get through it. If you play on multiple consoles, the upcb is really the way to go. If you’re worried about asking a “dumb” question or even something that’s been asked already, just send me a pm.
I can’t help but notice that 9.3k is roughly 4.7k *2, so I’m immediately leaning towards a problem with the pinout; the resistances between the grounds and VCCs also seem to point this way as well. I’m wondering if the weird backwards pinout of the IDC connector is biting you in the butt.
With the pad connected, check the resistance between the ‘Up’ pin on the UPCB stick connector, and the ‘Up’ wire you soldered to the pad. Ditto for Down, and then check the resistance the other way: from the Up pin on the UPCB to the wire soldered to Down on the pad and visa versa
If there was a mistake in pinning out the ribbon cable, those two will be switched from where they should be.
Then there is definitely a wiring problem with many things not connected where they should be. The Up pin on the UPCB should be directly connected to the ribbon wire you solder to Up on the PCB. If there was a problem with the pins having each pair swapped from what they should be, it would have shown zero resistance between Up on the pad and Down on the UPCB, so it’s not that. Next thing I’d check is the resistance between the VCC_TEST point and the RB4 wire which should be going to the Guide button. If that shows zero resistance, then the ribbon was probably pinned upside down. Another pair to test for the same thing would be the Up and Down pins on the UPCB stick connector to the fourth punch and fourth kick buttons which should be going to the triggers.
Shit. Looks like I did get screwed by the backasswards IDC layout. I went 123456 instead of 214365 etc. I REALLY am not looking forward to redoing the whole pad. I have a nasty history with pads and … well pads coming off.
But there doesn’t seem to be any other way around it unless I want to deal with the IDC connector. That’s pretty easy to break too. Arg. Suggestions?
Yeah, clip the zip tie, desolder the ribbon cable, and start over. Do NOT touch that IDC connector!!! Those things are just a serious PITA and if it’s locked down, you can forget about trying to remove it and redo it. Trying to mess around and rearrange things on the IDC end is just asking for enough frustration to slit your wrists. You know the problem, you know how to find what wire goes where, and you know how to doublecheck by checking resistance against the matching pin on the UPCB; it may suck to have to do, but its simple time consuming work which means you can plod through it without testing your already exhausted patience.
Alright. Just to double check before I get going, with the way I have the ribbon cable attached to the IDC connector, it would make it so that starting from the edge going inward, the brown cable would be 2, the red cable would be 1, the orange cable would be 4, the yellow cable would be 3, the green cable would be 6, the blue cable would be 5, etc?
Assuming the notch on the male IDC connector is on the side AWAY from the PIC on the board (which is should be), yes, that’s correct. Your brown one the edge would go to VCC, next red would be fierce, followed by orange-down and yellow-up. In fact, it looks identical to how the ribbon is laid out in the instructable, so check the colors in the images as you go.
Time to test with some Triggerheart and SFHD :]