How to Use the Playstation 3 Controller in Windows Vista
September 21 Carl Nelson
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The plan was to re-familiarize myself with all the original NES Mega Man games, in preparation for a review of Mega Man 9 which is being released this week on all three consoles. Of course, I bought Mega Man 2 on Wii Virtual Console as soon as it came out, but amazingly that is the only Mega Man game available for Wii.
Since my NES is packed away in storage, the next best solution is *gasp* emulation. I haven’t emulated games in a long time - I never had the need to really. Most of the games I liked to play are available on Virtual Console and many have been re-released for DS and PSP. Retro gaming is actually alive an well, thanks to handheld platforms.
So after picking up an emulator (I opted for Nestopia, which works very well in Vista by the way) I had to find a controller. As it turns out, I am very picky about controllers, especially for playing older games. When I play an NES game, I want something that is as close to an NES controller as possible. When I play SNES, I want a SNES controller. That’s why I love the Wii Remote and Classic Controller so much; they do a very good job of emulating the feel of the originals (I just wish we could remap the buttons on the Classic, so we can use Y and B as B and A - if you’ve played Super Mario All Stars on SNES, you will know what I mean).
But for the PC, decent controllers are few and far between. There are custom controllers out there - NES and SNES controllers converted to USB that natively support the latest operating systems. Cheap adapters are out there as well; everything from the NES controller to the DualShock 2 can be used with these. I needed one now though, and my choices were the XBOX 360 controller (no thanks, that cross pad is absolutely wretched), the gamepad that came with the Foxconn GeForce 7950 GT we reviewed last year (appreciate that they threw it in, but the cross pad is even worse than the 360’s), or one of my Playstation 3 controllers - DualShock 3 and original SixAxis. These controllers are pretty much perfect, as they have a nice cross pad feel, and a layout similar to the SNES.
If you’ve tried to install a SixAxis or DualShock 3 on a Windows Vista PC, I think you know where I’m going with this. It is actually identified in the Game Controllers section of the control panel, but doesn’t seem to accept button inputs.
After some quick Googling, you might have come across a plethora of blogs from about a year ago, saying that the PS3 controller will work with Windows if you just replace the original USB HID drivers with an open-source version called libusb. You might have installed that driver, only to have your keyboard and mouse disappear after rebooting, because your USB controller has been completely disabled. Yup, happened to me too - dig out the old PS/2 mouse or keyboard you still have laying around, and get rid of those drivers! (now I know why motherboards still have these ports!)
Anyway, libusb will not work with Vista, so we’re back to square-one.
However, there is a solution. A Chinese programmer has put together a PS3 controller driver that works with standard USB HID. That driver is called SixAxisDriver, and you can grab it right here. Simply run the install, load the driver, reboot Vista, and your controller will be identified and will start working! I should mention that this only works in 32 bit versions of Windows.
how to use the PS3 controller in Windows Vista:
- Plug in your PS3 controller (SixAxis or DualShock 3)
- Download and install this driver
- Load the driver
- Reboot
- Done!
Just to make things clear, this driver DOES work in Windows XP (32 bit). However, the old method also works with XP, so this isn’t big news for them. This method is better than replacing your Windows drivers with those open-source ones though.
Now, time to get back to those Mega Man games, and prepare myself for Mega Man 9! Quickman’s stage still pwns me to death.
Filed under: PC Hardware, Video Game Hardware
Tags: Controllers, h4x, Retro Gaming
please consider making one for 64bit Vista users :(
I just tried this in Vista64 and it doesn’t work. Is it 32bit only? I tried it once earlier without success, but since someone made a recent article about it I thought I would try it again.
It don’t work for me, do you know if the PS3 driver is supported in Vista 64?
libusb works fine for me on vista, and the is no need to restart my computer.
Or you could just buy the gamecube megaman 10th anniversery disc and have them all
Please tell us the source of your information.
I assume this is for a wired controller? What about a wireless controller? What more would you need to get that to work?
I think there are drivers out there that allow these to be used with Bluetooth. I’ll check it out and report on it… I just need to find my BT adapter!
ughhh, i need a 64 bit driver…and i can’t find any! Anybody know where i can get one?
OMG!!! i dont post on blogs but u guys are retards. the driver dosent work with 64 bit read he fukin article