After viewing this post on Engadget I wondered about taking the inside of a Xbox 360 controller and installing it into a Wii Classic Controller Pro. Might this be possible and if so, are there any modders willing to take on the job?
If it was the first iteration of the classic controller I’d guess no, but after checking out the pro I’d say probably. It’s beyond what I feel comfortable taking as a job, FYI if you find a modder to do it they are probably going to want a arm and leg. Pad hacking is the ultimate nuisance people who do the 360 Macro controllers charge $2-$300 and this is a comparable job check GBAtemp alot of modders there would find this in their territory.
If you attempt it yourself I’d go with the PowerA CPFA010027 Mini Pro Ex Controller X360, it’s small and cheaper than a 360 pad if you screw the pooch.
I would say cut the electronics from a Wii classic pro, and wire up to a project box that has the Xbox 360 pad’s PCB
Or you can hire Ben Heck
And why the Wii Classic Controller?!
He probably wants to play with a real d-pad.
Nintendo owns the trademark on the True cross D-pad, and it’s definitely the best of the best, Also the octo-cut around the analog make it the only analog stick that is quality for fighters.
It’s an interesting idea. Doing an in-controller dual-mod or replacement would be tricky, to say the least – there just isn’t a whole lot of room inside the CCP. If we were talking about going to a PS3 controller, that’d be a different issue (custom boards can be made that are way smaller), but fitting a retail PCB of a 360 controller would probably be a very daunting task.
If you don’t mind extra bulk, there are a couple of other options – First, you could (as was mentioned earlier) externalize all the connections, and run them to a project enclosure with a dual-mod in it. That would be ugly, but simple and it’d get the job done.
Alternatively, you could create a convertor for it – that’d be much more complicated, as you’d need a microcontroller that can talk to the I2C bus of the CCP (I’m pretty sure that’s been fully reverse engineered by now, so the code already exists), and then emulate all of the inputs on a separate 360 controller PCB. Done carefully, this shouldn’t introduce too much lag into the system, but it’s ugly from a development standpoint and fairly expensive. Oh, and the analogue sticks would be a pain to make… analogue. The advantages of this method are that the same hardware could take in any Wii add-on controllers; you also wouldn’t need to hardware mod the controllers themselves, as you could just get the connector for it.
EDIT: Now that I really think about it, I’m honestly very intrigued by this challenge. It may very well be possible to do a simple dual-mod a la the Engadget article… if you could get the right size of PCB, and there was enough room in the case. I don’t know that these two elements are possible, though, and I can’t afford to buy a bunch of parts for experimentation right now. I only have a normal Classic Controller, not the pro – I’ll take a look at how much modding potential that has (haven’t ever opened it up). If you’ve got a CCP and want to provide internal pictures, I might be able to judge the feasibility better. I’m at work, so I can’t go looking right now.
I really like all nintendo contollers the snes and gamecube had the best d-pads. I really was looking at a SNES pad looking at this article here or even a gamecube controller possibly, but when I thought about it the classic pro has same number of buttons and a spot for the home button so it seemed more feasible.
Its definitely a complicated job, but what made think it could be done was seeing the ps360 article. Now the micro 360 controller could possibly work the real trouble the I could think of would be the left analog pad. I’ll list some points what seems to doable and what’s a stretch
Doable maybe?
[LIST]
[]buttons on wii controller should be able to be used
[]back, start, and home are laid out the same
[]Right analog
[/LIST]
Hard part
[LIST]
[]left analog (looking at the ps360 article this looks like the hardest part)
[]shoulder buttons and triggers
[]rumble motors and head phone jack(both items not really needed)
[/LIST]
Also, I wouldn’t mind a converter. There is one that converts wii classic to usb from mayflash and it can be used on a ps3 or cpu, but you know the xbox and it usb it different as far as controllers go.
Inside of classic pro shown here
[media=youtube]h8yCaQxr_KE[/media]
I took more than a cursory look at the mod on Engadget; was thinking it was another transplant mod that I saw (IIRC on Ben Heck’s site) a while back. The problem with the way it’s done in that post is that it modifies the “feel” of the buttons – he replaces them with tactile switches, so the throw and pressure to activate are gonna be way different than the stock controller. I can’t load YouTube videos here at work, so I’ll check it out at home… if I could strip down an Xbox controller PCB to be “thin” enough (hopefully there aren’t any tall passives on it), it might be feasible to make a cut out behind where the stock CCP board is by Dremel-ing out a bunch of plastic.
The wiring isn’t a concern for me, honestly – as long as the stock contacts are on the board, it should be a cinch. From what I’ve read, it’s a common ground pad, which just simplifies things. If nothing else, cutting the CCP board in thirds and removing the middle of it would be acceptable, if that would make enough room for a 360 PCB – that way the stock pad contacts on the D-Pad and playing buttons (ABXY) would remain the same. Menu buttons (+/-/Home) could then be replaced with tactile switches fairly easily, and the daughterboard that carries the joysticks could remain untouched (assuming the pots on the joystick axes are appropriately valued).
When I get home, first thing I’m doing is taking a tri-wing to my current classic controller; that’ll give me a better idea of the room inside I’d be working with for this.