SHANWAN / PS3 CONTROLLER Pi3 RETROPIE 3.6 BLUETOOTH SETUP

luetzel

Hi @Wolfman100,
the output of bluetoohctl can be quite confusing, even when my controller is paired (LED1 on), the device info of bluetoohctl still shows 'Paired: no'. I'm not worried about that, although this information is somewhat misleading.

There seems to be a difference between your broken Shanwan controller and your new one. In contrast to the old PS3 controller, it is recognized as SZMY-POWER CO.,LTD. PLAYSTATION(R)3 Controller. My Google search for SZMY-POWER points into the direction, that the D-Pad and both analog sticks of your controller are being registered as separate joysticks, i.e. for each axis a new [...]/input? device is created. This does not happen with the Shanwan controller. Here we have a single [...]/input? device assigned.

I don't think that your issue is related to bluez or pairing, but it must happen downstream of the pairing event. I'm not sure what exactly generates the input devices (udev rule?), but I believe that it must be the key to solve your problem.

Wolfman100

@luetzel Ohhhh...that seems quite strange.Yes the controller doesn't appear to be a straight Shanwan copy and behaves a bit differently,for example it flashes when battery level is low,which is something the Shanwan never did.

The input thing is kind of confusing,as if it was making a different input for each axis wouldn't Emulation Station see these inputs as separate controllers rather than just one controller.Also wouldn't 'Jstest' also give some feedback regardless?

I created a 'udev' rule as recommended to do so by @buzz,but I'm not really entirely sure what a 'udev' rule actually does.

trevevs

@luetzel said in SHANWAN / PS3 CONTROLLER Pi3 RETROPIE 3.6 BLUETOOTH SETUP:

sorry that the link to my blog did not work for you! Hope that you are able to pair your PS3 clone now. My blog is on a self-hosted server, consisting of a Banana Pi. It connects via dyndns, so that it is occasionally not reachable when my IP changes.

@luetzel no probs mate I got there in the end!

@Wolfman100 na turns out I was missing libical as per https://discourse.osmc.tv/t/howto-retrosmc-retrogaming-on-osmc/6671/920 I did get it working for a little while! Now Im having dramas after it seems I paired the 2nd shanwan. Seems ok in emu station, but when I load an emulator like mame the controller seems to get confused and re-pairs to player 2 or 3 and doesnt work anymore. Ive deleted the pairing of both and trying to find some time to try re-pair them. Anything else I need to do? Like to I need to manually delete ps3 pl1 + pl2 config file or something? I was thinking my mistake may have been using the same Pi3 USB port to pair each? Maybe I should have done pl1 on port 0 & pl2 on port 1 perhaps??

Smithers

Hi Wolfman100.

Just wondered if you have got any further in setting up your pad? I too have bought a pair of the 'SZMY-POWER' pads thinking that they were the normal Shanwan / Gasia, but they are not.

I have followed your guide @luetzel (thanks!) and it all seems to work great from the outset, ie the pads will pair up as expected and player 1 and player 2 LED's light up correctly on every boot.... but... I get no input reading when running jtest and RetroPie does not capture any input either. I have also tried evtest but no events are being captured either.

I have created a Udev rule (both manually as described by Buzz and also through the RetroPie setup script), but still no inputs being detected on either pad (I have also tried each pad individually).

I am at a loss now - is there anything else I could try to get these pads working? Everything regarding pairing is working excellent, just can't get any input to register. :( Has anyone else had success with these particular 'SZMY-POWER' pads? Here is a link to the pad itself and they are branded as 'PowerRider': http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01HI4BAW2

I am using the v4b2 image downloaded from here and have upgraded via setup script to v4RC1.

Thanks all for the tips so far! :)

luetzel

Hi @all

a bug-fix of Bluez (5.41) was released on 19th of July. I synced it with the patched version for Gasia/Shanwan clones (https://github.com/luetzel/bluez). Compiled without errors/warnings on the latest Raspbian. Can't tell if it works for the SZMY-POWER pads, please check it out ...

Cheers,
/luetzel

Smithers

@luetzel thanks for the update. I will give this a try tomorrow and report my findings. :)

Wolfman100

Hi @Smithers ,

Unfortunately I haven't got any further with this as I needed to take a break from it before I completely lost my mind wasting so much time trying to get these pads working.

It seems that you are experiencing exactly the same issue as I am,having no problems pairing the controller...but no input being registered.

I may endevour in the next 24 hours to attempt to get this working....again!

dmt408

@luetzel I tried it with their update and was unable to get it to work with the SZMY-POWER controllers

Wolfman100

@dmt408 @Smithers

As far as I'm aware ,I have already tried getting the SZMY-POWER controllers working with the latest bugfixed Bluez 5.41 with unfortunately no success.

Still no input registered in JStest

Smithers

Hi.

Ok so I have some good news - I have got my SZMY-POWER pads working!

I had made a backup prior to the first attempt with Bluez so I restored from that and tried the new version of Bluez from @luetzel , followed your guide again to completion BUT, this time it won't recognise my pad via Bluetooth? So last time it would pair multiple pads but wouldnt capture any inputs / events, but this time it won't pick the SZMY pad up via Bluetooth at all? Sixpair appears to work, in that it recognises the bluetooth address and sets it as expected, its just the bluetooth pairing that doesnt work.

So - I restored the image again to back before Bluez was installed, I then carried out a full update through RetroPie Setup Script (took quite a while as it was building a new version of MAME), and then went straight in to set up the PAD via the RetroPie script, chose 'Gasia Only' support..... and it worked first time! So I have now paired 2 SZMY pads and 1 'Genuine Gasia' pad (I bought a pair when I thought the SZMY pads wouldnt work), and they are all working fine and can work together at the same time. The only issue I can see is that the LED's all display as Player 1, which they are not (I get JS0, JS1 & JS2 in JSTEST when they're all connected and each of them work independently), but that is something that I can live with.

I would love to say that there was a specific thing I tried, but all I done was try again through the setup script, chose Gasia only, and it worked. I have rebooted about 20 times since and it works on every reboot. All I could suggest is that you update, try again and see if it works for you? If I can share the driver that is installed somehow then I will, just let me know how to do that.

Good luck all - incidentally if anyone knows how to get around the 'Player 1 LED' issue then I'm all ears, but its not a problem as such in fairness.

Wolfman100

@Smithers Good Work and great News!I presume this was born out of some random experimentation,as all great solutions seem to be...

I will look into this shortly and see if theirs a clearly replacteable way to get this working.

I think it may soon be useful to start a new thread which in some way summarises what's required for replica and non-replica PS3 controller pairing and break it down for each one of the replica types we've come across.I think this would help quite a few people out.

Wolfman100

@Smithers I can report that I have updated RetroPie and I have removed all other PS3 pairing configs etc and just installed just Gasia support and still no response from buttons.

I think this is however due to Bluez and Sixad still being installed as in @luetzel's guide.I think I will have to remove these first.

Wolfman100

@Smithers @dmt408 @luetzel

I can now happily confirm that I have managed to get the SZMY-POWER pad working.I am not sure exactly WHAT process has managed to get this working.But it is definitely one of the following:

Removing all PS3 drivers
Updating RetroPie
Installing the Gasia Only Driver

Access :

cd /usr/sbin/

and then change permissions:

sudo chmod 755 sixad-sixaxis

Restarting Sixad Daemon:

sudo /etc/init.d/sixad restart

Then when at the Emulation Screen where it says 1 Gamepad detected it seemed to register but only if I held the right thumb button down...which is a bit weird,but then it went to the next stage to configure the buttons and they all registered and configured without an issue.

The only drawback now being that when I restart RetroPie it goes straight past the Emulation Station screen into RetroPie and the controller doesn't do anything anymore.

Steps closer...

Wolfman100

I can't get it running at all on my other build....so further investigations need to be made.I do have some hope now that it actually configured once that it is actually possible....

Wolfman100

I have now removed the Emulation Station configurations so that it prompts me to configure on the Emulation Screen again...although now it's back to not recognising any input again....arrrgrggghhhhh!

rocklima2

solve vibration cant stop? my controller not stop using usb cable, i need help to solve this problem

Wolfman100

Any ideas about any of this anyone?

@Smithers @dmt408 @luetzel

I can now happily confirm that I have managed to get the SZMY-POWER pad working.I am not sure exactly WHAT process has managed to get this working.But it is definitely one of the following:

Removing all PS3 drivers
Updating RetroPie
Installing the Gasia Only Driver

Access :

cd /usr/sbin/
and then change permissions:

sudo chmod 755 sixad-sixaxis
Restarting Sixad Daemon:

sudo /etc/init.d/sixad restart
Then when at the Emulation Screen where it says 1 Gamepad detected it seemed to register but only if I held the right thumb button down...which is a bit weird,but then it went to the next stage to configure the buttons and they all registered and configured without an issue.

The only drawback now being that when I restart RetroPie it goes straight past the Emulation Station screen into RetroPie and the controller doesn't do anything anymore.

Steps closer...

Pineapple12

Found this thread after a rather frustrating weekend. Figured I'd share a realization made when trying to pair my ShanWan controllers running RetroPie 3.8.1 on a RPi3 (built in bluetooth).

If you are using the LEDs as an indicator that the controllers are synced - DON'T.

I have 3 ShanWan controllers all bought from the same seller on Amazon. One of them will show the correct LED when synced. However, the other two will not. Instead, they continue to flash as if they are still trying to pair, but the flash will be about half as fast. The controllers seem to work fine, they're just constantly flashing half speed when synced.

I was trying everything to get them to pair when finally I noticed my "good" controller was showing #3 LED. Opened up the "Configure Input" screen in RetroPie and sure enough they were paired. Wanted to share this tip in case anyone else might be having the same problem and not even know it. The flashing is annoying though, so if anyone knows a fix to this I would really appreciate it!

luetzel

@Pineapple12
did you pair your controllers using sixad or bluez?

Pineapple12

@luetzel I used Sixad from the script built into RetroPie 3.8.1. I also managed to get them to pair using Blues and your instructions once, but couldn't get them to sync again after a reboot. The LEDs did work correctly through Bluez though.