PS3 Controller Will Not Pair v4.7.7

[A Former User]

@crush I have... the instructions say to plug in the USB, unplug then press the home button. In the screen that follows listing all the devices found my controller is not listed?

[mustangfanatic01]

@plangham

Having just gone through this recently myself....it is frustrating. I have a couple of ripoff PS3 controllers (Gasia) that I was completely unable to get to pair using the (recommended) sixaxis driver. I spent hours messing with it. I was eventually able to get one to pair using the older ps3controller driver following the directions that you mentioned. However, if you turn the controller off (or it turns itself off from inactivity) it will not pair again until you reboot the pi. At least in my case. Also the hand-off between wired and wireless doesn't seem to work.

However, using my official DualShock3 the pairing pretty much works as expected (still not as painless as say a PS4 controller). Handoff between wired/wireless is great, and it will reconnect to BT without having to reboot the Pi. So without knowing which clone you have it's hard to say for sure.

However, what I have learned from my experience is that if you want to do wireless, it's worth just sacking up and getting an official controller. IMO spending $60 on a new PS4 controller directly from Sony (do not buy from amazon) is money well spent to save yourself hours of frustration. Official PS3 controllers are hard to find, and the PS4 controller is so much easier to pair anyways.

Oh and also, my clone controllers, even when "working" still don't show an appropriate player 1/2/3/4 led on the controller, whereas the official ones do.

[A Former User]

@mustangfanatic01 Thanks for the info, I take your point on getting a PS4 controller and may well end up down that route but its for my brother.

How did you go about loading the old ps3controller driver?

[mustangfanatic01]

@plangham

I'm also making one of these for my brother, and that's why I'm just going to get him a PS4 controller. If it's difficult/frustrating for me, he's never going to figure it out when it starts acting flaky.

I pretty much followed the guide:
https://retropie.org.uk/docs/PS3-Controller/

Since I had first gone the sixaxis route, I ended up removing all the installed packages under [Manage Packages] -> [Driver]. Then I installed the ps3controller driver, and tried configuring it through there as well. I think I did have to then back out to Emulation Station and go to Bluetooth and follow the pairing instructions there. (have it plugged in via usb, remove it, press PS button, then plug back in. Then it said it worked and when I unplugged it from usb it paired after a few seconds). It took a few tries, the whole process was very frustrating.

My experience with the PS4 controller on a brand new RetroPie image was to go to Bluetooth, search for devices, put the PS4 controller in pair mode (hold Share + PS buttons), and it found it immediately. No extra drivers or fuss. If it was the first controller connected, it lights up blue (Player 1). If I had another controller connected already it lights up red for Player 2.

[mustangfanatic01]

I should mention that in the configuration I only saw options for Gasia and Shanwan (and clone variants). My faux ps3 controller showed up as Gasia (when you "Configure Input" in EmulationStation), so I tried both Gasia options I saw in there. I think Gasia (Clone) was what ended up working for me. Lot of trial and error

[pscotto1234]

I'm having same issue. The strange thing is that I have 2 raspberry pi 4 and I can easly pair my controller only with one of them. When I install the uSD in the other raspberry I cannot have the controller paired.
Any suggestions?

[pscotto1234]

Hi all,
after testing several raspberry it seems that problem is related to the hardware version.
Calling cat /proc/cpuinfo I see that the working model has a Hardware Revision B03112 while all others non working models (6 different raspberry) have Hardware Revision B03112.
Any suggestion? @mitu do you know if is there a bug on this revision?

[mitu]

@pscotto1234 said in PS3 Controller Will Not Pair v4.7.7:

Calling cat /proc/cpuinfo I see that the working model has a Hardware Revision B03112 while all others non working models (6 different raspberry) have Hardware Revision B03112.

I don't see a difference between the revisions you've posted.

Any suggestion? @mitu do you know if is there a bug on this revision?

No, I don't think so.

[pscotto1234]

@mitu sorry. I mean B03114 not working; B03112 working.
I tried with a clean 4.7.1, a 4.7.9 and a 4.7.11

[mitu]

@pscotto1234 Based on https://www.raspberrypi.org/documentation/hardware/raspberrypi/revision-codes/README.md,

• b03112 is Revision 1.2, 4Gb model.
• b03114 is Revision 1.4, 2GB model.

is that correct ?

[pscotto1234]

@mitu no, I have only 2GB RAM model.

[mitu]

@pscotto1234 After moving the sdcard to the other system, you should remove any connected devices before attempting pairing - have you tried that ?

[pscotto1234]

@mitu yes, I removed all device from the menu “Remove Bluetooth Device”.
I’m going crazy trying to solve!