SNES USB adapter review and teardown

SNES to USB adapter $4.99

I bought this a few years back and is my emulator workhorse. I grew up with the NES and the NES controller will always be my first love but the extra buttons of the SNES controller are to versatile to not use. I mostly play Atari 2600 and NES games with it. For casual play I use the shoulder buttons for save state save/load and for speedrunning I use them for start/reset timer. As far as Windows software I use Joytokey, works flawlessly. I was NOT able to get this working properly on my Linux laptop. 

Lets begin the vivisection…

epoxy glob, is expected. simple, thick traces, well marked…

Single sided. This is asking to be hacked into a SNES PC or some other project. Circuit boards don’t get more simple than this.

I have seen complaints of these not working on arrival. If that happens you can send it back or try to fix it if thats not and option. Repops and similar USBsnes controllers are significantly more expensive than this.

100% recommend. (except for Linux)

 

Edit: After “talking” with some folks on reddit, there seems to be concerns about input lag. I don’t notice whatever lag it does have. I understand “I don’t notice” is not a measurement and I likely just have muscle memory and anticipate what buttons I need to press early. With twitch FPS games any lag is a big concern but as far as retro games 2600, NES, SNES, etc I don’t have a problem with a few millisecond of lag.

SNES controller upgrade, custom buttons and replacement membrane set.

SNES custom buttons – dark grey  – $2

Button membrane set – $2.75

This particular controller is used on my laptop (via USB adapter + joytokey). The right button on the D-pad is flaccid. Also I always liked the look of the SNES but was always bothered by the color of the Y,X,B,A buttons, they looked like Smarties candies.

Kitsh-bent: I’ve used them in the past and liked the results, I may try Hand Held Legend in the future. The order came with an advertisement bracelet, I wish it hadn’t. I’m not going to wear this shit and its to big for my kids who would probably wear it for a day and lose it. Mind you I’m complaining about free stuff so its not a big complaint.

SNES custom buttons: The custom buttons are exceptional!

Button membrane set: this… this is not so exceptional.

You can see that the new (top) membranes are less substantial than the original (bottom).

The D-pad membrane fits OK.

The Y,X,B,A button membrane has to be slightly bent to fit between the two “posts”. I’m not liking this.

The START and SELECT membrane/buttons are to close together so fitment isn’t right. I put the original back.

Originals fit much better and match the new buttons better as well.

Now that everything is put back together, the D-pad feels great. The Y,X,B,A buttons feel a little to easy to push and the START and SELECT membrane/buttons were complete crap so I didn’t use them. All that said I love the way it looks and how the D-pad feels. I might go back to the original membrane for the Y,X,B,A buttons.

Don’t forget to keep original parts, they don’t take up much space and you never know if/when you’ll need them.