Cannot get Xbox 360 wireless gamepad to work with RetroPie

gordonfreemanjr

I'm on RPi4. Whatever I do, I can't get my Xbox 360 wireless gamepad to work, while the other wireless gamepad works just fine - it's based on radio connectivity, not Bluetooth though.

I followed ETA Prime's guide:

however it doesn't work: during the final step - Register and Connect Bluetooth Device - the gamepad is never found.

What ETA does and I can't however is updating the gamepad's firmware. It's impossible: I don't own an Xbox, and the Xbox Accessories app for Windows 10 is broken. Whatever I do - and I tried a lot - it won't even let me configure the controller, let alone updating it: it simply shuts down after I hit a B key on the controller.

Both, the receiver and controller, pair up just fine on the PC. On the RPi4 however they just won't: the receiver lights up fine, but when I search for it with the "pair" function on the controller, it's never found.

I reached the end of my wits. I do have xboxdrv installed & enabled on my RetroPie, freshly updated from the source. There are 3 other USB devices connected: an external drive, a wireless keyboard/mouse dongle and the second wireless (radio based) controller).

mitu

See https://retropie.org.uk/docs/Xbox-360-Controller/. If your controller does not support Bluetooth, why do you think it would connect via Bluetooth to your Pi ?
I haven't looked at the video, but I presume it's about an Xbox One Bluetooth enabled controller. As the doc says - if you have a 'wireless' Xbox 360 controller, you need an USB adapter to make it work with the Pi.

gordonfreemanjr

@mitu I do have the official Microsoft USB wireless adapter, referred to above clumsily as „the receiver”. Maybe I should’ve mentioned it, guess it felt kind of obvious. So: yes, it’s a Bluetooth controller.

Anyway: naturally I have it. I just can’t get it to work.

mitu

@gordonfreemanjr said in Cannot get Xbox 360 wireless gamepad to work with RetroPie:

Maybe I should’ve mentioned it, guess it felt kind of obvious. So: yes, it’s a Bluetooth controller.

Is it, though ? Can you precisely name the model of the controller ? Is it an Xbox360 or an Xbox One controller ? Does it work paired with a PC using only Bluetooth ?

gordonfreemanjr

@mitu You’re right, I should’ve mentioned it all to begin with. Sorry.

So: it’s a wireless Bluetooth Xbox 360 controller along with an official Microsoft Bluetooth USB dongle. Both work fine together on the PC: I put the dongle in the PC’s USB slot, it lights up green, then I press the pair button on the controller and it pairs up fine. No go on RetroPie though: the USB dongle lights up green just fine, so it works, but the controller just won’t find it.

(And yes, I’m aware that the YouTube guide I brought up refers to an Xbox One controller, but I figured the process should be more or less the same.)

mitu

@gordonfreemanjr said in Cannot get Xbox 360 wireless gamepad to work with RetroPie:

it’s a wireless Bluetooth Xbox 360 controller along with an official Microsoft Bluetooth USB dongle.

There's no such thing as a Bluetooth Xbox 360 controller - the original Xbox 360 controller doesn't have Bluetooth, it uses a proprietary wireless (IR AFAIR) connection. Since you're using the USB dongle to connect, there's no point in trying to add the controller via Bluetooth in RetroPIe (just as you didn't have to do it on a PC).

Take a look the Xbox One wireless dongle driver and see if installing it will make you controller work under Linux.

gordonfreemanjr

@mitu This is truly remarkable. Thanks to you I’ve just learned something about the world. It never crossed my mind that the Xbox 360 controller is NOT a Bluetooth device. I was absolutely convinced that it is.

Well, that solves it, I guess. Thanks for educating me and sorry about missing some obvious knowledge.

TechNovice

@gordonfreemanjr
They make USB->RF dongles for connecting an XBox 360 controller to a PC, and those can work on the Raspberry Pi (I’ve used mine with 3B, 4B and Zero, on Raspbian Stretch and Buster builds.) Mine is an off-brand ORTZ Gaming device, but you might still be able to find an official Microsoft branded dongle on your favorite Auction-bay or Retail-zon website. Price range seems to be ~$20-50 for something brand new, so it may not be worth it to you.
If you decide to go that route, you probably won’t need the Xboxdrv loaded. Try without it first, and only load Xboxdrv if the dongle isn’t working.

quicksilver

Xbox 360 controllers work great with a Xbox 360 wireless adapter. Afaik it connects via a proprietary 2.4ghz wireless connection. I have tried several third party brand adapters ranging in price from $10-20 and they all work perfectly out of the box. Simply sync the controller to the adapter and map the controller in emulationstation. Xboxdrv is not needed nor recommended for the typical setup (the default xpad driver works just fine).

gordonfreemanjr

@quicksilver I do have an Xbox 360 wireless adapter - and it just won’t sync. It does sync on a PC, but on the Pi it just won’t. Maybe I should disable xboxdrv?

quicksilver

@gordonfreemanjr can you post a link to the adapter you are using? You definitely don't need xboxdrv, you can remove it.

gordonfreemanjr

@quicksilver OK, here’s the finale of the whole thing:

it works. It just works. I plugged it in, just for the final time, just to make absolutely sure that it won’t budge - and it works. The reason? I’ve deactivated xboxdrv. That’s it.

Looks like I made things harder for myself, as usual.

There’s only one thing I don’t get: both of my pads are Xbox pads, one offcial and the other one a copy. After connecting - and they both connect and work OK - their LED indicator in the middle of the gamepad shows them as Player 2. Weird.

quicksilver

@gordonfreemanjr do you have any other controllers plugged in? Did you map your keyboard as a controller? It may be worth going into RetroPie-setup and resetting your mappings and then remapping just to see if that fixes the light issue.