NViRT

A while ago I wrote about the XFPS 360 units that allow you to connect a keyboard and mouse to your Xbox 360. These boxes man-in-the-middle attack a wired 360 controller’s protocol to bypass the 360’s peripheral security. Once connected to the 360, the XFPS unit allows you to plug in ps/2 (protocol) keyboards and mice, usb keyboards and mice, or PS2 (gaming system) DualShock controllers. Sounds great huh? Well, it’s not. It’s horrible. Accomplishing anything greater than minor aiming tricks sits near “why bother” even with the sniper model of the XFPS.

If you remember my original review of the XFPS, I talk about how the unit translates input from a keyboard and mouse and literally pukes the translated input at the Xbox 360. So, in exorcist green projectile vomit fashion, you’ll be frolicking around Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4 worse off than you were with those barbaric analog sticks that made you purchase the XFPS in the first place. It makes you wonder why the creators of the XFPS even bothered at all outside of turning a quick buck. Lets recap the pitfalls of this hardware. 1) mediocre translation of keyboard/mouse inputs, 2) horrible deadzone 3) no acceleration compensation (more on these later). This list could go on, right down to the horrible shade of green on the sniper version, but we will just work with whats really important for now. What the XFPS does do fantastically is Playstation 2 controller translation. Wouldn’t it be great if someone could just utilize this port instead, considering the only reason I bought the XFPS is that it’s the only device that can bypass peripheral security? That’s where the Xbox360 Input Machine (XIM) and the ol’ Smart Joy Frag (SJF) comes in.

The SJF is a device for playing Playstation 2 games with a keyboard and mouse. Connecting the SJF to the XFPS gives you additional ps/2 ports, but with greater customization. The Smart Joy Frag has a dead-zone compensation setting that fixes dead-zone for the most part. You see, analog sticks are pretty sensitive devices. The springs that keep them centered don’t always land the stick back to their dead center position. Games overcome this by implementing an area of input on the sticks that translate to zero. Say the center of the sticks vertical input is a reading of 12310. in our example, pulling back on the stick and letting the stick snap back into place will put the reading back at anywhere between 12320 and 12300. A dead-zone of +- 10 on the vertical axis will allow the game to safely recognize non-center positioning of the stick outside of the springs’ ability to properly place the sticks on dead center each time.

When the XFPS receives mouse movements, it tries its best to translate the speed of the mouse to a static position of an analog stick. This means that you’ll have to move the mouse fast enough to get the XFPS to “place” the stick past the dead-zone. Trust me, it sucks. And few things outside of a high DPI mouse make it any better. An XFPS+SJF setup is one of those things. Using the dead-zone compensation of the SJF pushes the stick to +- 32 with even the slightest movement of the mouse. The down side to this setup is that the SJF needs a voltage regulator hack to get some newer power hungry gaming mice to work with a ps/2-usb adapter, and the lack of acceleration compensation. All in all this setup will work for most that don’t mind adapting to a little change in mechanics that cannot be overcome.

In comes XIM. The Xbox Input Machine. A comparative behemoth of a setup that will grant you endless customization of all the issues that plague keyboard/mouse to analog stick translation. This device is controlled by your computer, which takes inputs from your computer and translates them into Playstation2 controller output signals that the XFPS recognizes. Again, since the XFPS is required to bypass peripheral security on the Xbox 360, it is a necessity. But since the XFPS is a fantastic PS2 translator, that’s the port we will use. In more detail, the XIM setup consists of a PC running windows close to your 360, a micro controller that takes input commands from the XIM software running on your PC and generates PS2-ish signals, an XFPS 360 (any revision will do, ebay), and a wired controller to initiate the connection with the 360. That is PC -> XIM -> XFPS -> 360 (wired controller plugs into the XFPS). This setup takes work, but once complete you’ll have the best possible to date.

Running the XIM software on your PC takes control of your keyboard and mouse inputs and starts sending them to the XIM hardware. To edit some advanced settings hit CTRL-ENTER and the application brings up notepad with the running configuration file. Here there are all sorts of settings for things like dead-zone size, dead-zone shape, acceleration compensation, button settings for momentary alternate sensitivity and even macros (with a little extra programming using the open API). The mastermind behind this project is OBsIV. His blog entry detailing the process for making your own XIM is here. If you don’t want to build one but still desire this glorious hardware, I highly suggest you join the forums and get in contact with a group buy coordinator (DerekTM is god). There you can buy one for around $80 USD shipped within the US and a little more for overseas shipping. A full review of this product is coming in Round Three of this article…so stay tuned.