How to get the Xbox360 Chatpad to work on the PC?

[Pinnacle [Rob]]

Well as you may or may not know, Microsoft has not bothered to develop a PC driver so as of now the PC has no way to read from the Xbox360 Chatpad (aka 360 Messenger Kit). I guess it's too much to ask that MS pay a small team of developers for a week or so (would it even take that long) to support their flagship product (ie Windows)... I mean, it's not like they don't have the money or the people. I just don't get it. It's like if Ford made a new series of cars and just didn't bother to create a key to start the engine.

Anyway, but for those of you that are TRULY desperate to get the chatpad working on the PC, there may be a solution... but there are several catches so this really is not a solution for most people. As you can see from this video on YouTube, it is possible to send keyboard messages to your PC with the chatpad...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWWIuh1vsoM

Only problem is (and the video doesn't really explain this very well) is that you need to have an XBOX 360 console... and then basically you can run the XNA written code (compatble for both Windows and Xbox360 console) which in turns comunicates with your PC (through networking) to send signals to end up on your PC... and thus also allow you to use it with Pinnacle (if that's your goal) through the keyboard hot key support.

Now if that weren't a big enough hassle, the real catch is that in order to run "homebrew" code on an Xbox360 console... you need to be part of the XNA Creator's Club... and that's not free. I believe it's $49.99 for a 4 month membership or $99.99 for a 1 year membership... so that's quite a lot to spend just to use the chatpad on your PC... especially considering those, er... knuckleheads, at Microsoft should have just given us a driver for Windows in the first place.

But yet for anyone that REALLY wants to get the chatpad working for their HTPC setups, here are the instructions to do so...
http://a3w.ivory.ne.jp/softwares/xpcc_en.html

And maybe if we are lucky, by the time your 1 year membership runs out, hopefully MS will finally give us a PC driver.


Also note that I have not actually tried this myself, but I have no reason to think it would not work... but I have checked every possible way that I could develop something like this without everyone needing a paid membership to XNA, and that does not seem to be possible (which is why I decided to just make this post for anyone interested). So if anyone does decide to try this then I would be happy to hear feedback... and also this XNA code (developed by someone else, not me) seems to be made with hard-coded operations, meaning that for instance his software will move the mouse with the left joystick and that's not something I think you can customize, or change to the right stick or disable or anything... which means that it's going to interfere with Pinnacle if you try to use them together... but if that's the case then I would be willing to try to "cut" out the unwanted code from his XNA source so that it would ONLY do the chatpad and leave everything else for Pinnacle to handle without interferance... which not only of course gives you more customization, but I would imagine that the mouse emulation is no where need as in-depth as Pinnacle's is so it may not work very well in comparison. Anyway, so if anyone decides to do this, then let me know and I will do my best to help you.


As a possible alternative for HTPC users, you might consider having a look at this PS3 device (which also can work on the PC of course).
http://pinnaclegameprofiler.com/foru...ad.php?t=11678

And another possible alternative is the NyKo iType2, check out this user review here...
http://pinnaclegameprofiler.com/foru...ad.php?t=18183


here is a post that was on page 6, but I copied it here so people would find it...

Hey everybody, there are tons of people out there who want these drivers made as you can see. I just set up a forum to rally us together to hopefully convince Microsoft or, if not, then maybe put together a donation fund and have a third-party driver made. I know it's been a long time since most of these posts were written, but if you're still interested PLEASE just sign up on the forum and make a 2-second post saying you're still interested, you don't have have to confirm your email:

http://nostalgium.com/forum/

There are legions of people -- especially HTPC (home-theater PC) users -- who need this, and seeing as the Xbox360 controller is arguably the best joystick, I know there are a ton of future possibilities for the chatpad. I would like to develop for it myself, but without ANY way to interface with it, it's a wonderful piece of hardware with no purpose to PC users. Again, please just sign up on the forum link above and let us know that you're one of many who would like to use this.

THANK YOU!

[Pinnacle [Gary]]

Madcatz has a chatpad for the PS3 controller. But I don't know if this work with the pc. http://store.gameshark.com/viewItem....idCategory=130

[Pinnacle [Rob]]

That might be a better alternative for now... if anyone decides to pick one of these up, please let us know how it works.

[Pinnacle [Gary]]

I'm interested to know if this madcatz chatpad is powered by the ps3 controller, or does it take batteries. Assuming it runs on batteries & assuming it actually works on the pc, then I guess it's possible to 'rig it up' to a 360 controller.

[trover]

the madcatz keyboard works perfectly fine, however it clips to the top of the ps3 controller, and you have to run another cord to the computer. It has awkward positioning up there, making it difficult to use unlike the very well designed but horribly implemented xbox 360 chat pad. but as for the chat pad.



there are actually other solutions that don't involve any drivers for it, again partially flawed, but not quite like $100 a year to use flawed. But i got my chat pad working about a week or so ago, by using an IPAC control board. I must state that it was not as easy as i hoped to be but you can controll the input through the drivers of the control board.

[Pinnacle [Gary]]

I googled IPAC and i'm not sure how this works. Is this some sort of hardware or just software?

[00Pontiac]

the IPAC is a keyboard controller, it's a combination of the hardware interface and the software, which is only used if you want to re-program a key setting. I have one in my converted Hotrod, they are awesome if you're a control freak like me.

http://www.ultimarc.com/ipac1.html

how do you hook one up to a chatpad tho the ipac is a hardware interface, you have to hard wire it to your controllers buttons.

[00Pontiac]

which reminds me, has Admin had any good thoughts about F Key Support for DiNovo mini's yet? (I remember you going off to think about it some time ago now)

[Pinnacle [Rob]]

I have been very busy with a lot of other stuff lately, so no I haven't really got a chance to add new stuff like "F Key Support for DiNovo mini". I think that will be possible, but it probably won't be anything coming real soon since there are a lot of other things I really need to get done before devoting time to other new feature ideas.

[00Pontiac]

thanks! that's great, I will wait patiently then.

Right now I have a profile for my x360 configured for F keys to support the keyboard LOL