My problem with playing video games on a PC is using the keyboard and mouse for game play.  After a quick Google search, I found a forum post on someone wanting to have his classic Xbox controller PC compatible.  Granted, there are adapters available for purchase; about 10 bucks plus shipping.  But why purchase when you can just make one yourself?  It takes all of 10 minutes and is relatively easy.  The only tools you need are wire strippers, electrical tape, a spare USB cable (any type will do), and your Xbox controller. 

To get started, go ahead and ship off the ends.  I cut mine off a couple of inches from the base of the adapters.  You will need to pull back the cable shielding to access the wires.  By the way, the wires are really small, maybe 24 gauge, so be careful not to accidentally cut or break them while trying to strip them.

As you can hopefully see, all of the wires match colors.  Red from the controller matches up to red in the USB cable, black matches with black, and so on.  All you really need to do at the point is twist the corresponding wires together, secure them with solder or electrical tape, and make sure none of the other ones are touching.  (There is a yellow wire that is use for various things in the Xbox controller like light guns.  I just taped mine out of the way. )

If you’re interested in which wires do what,

USB Pinout

Red=  +5v
Green= -DATA
White= +DATA
Black= -5v (Ground)

XBOX Pinout

Red= +5v
Green= -DATA
White= +DATA
Yellow= +12v (Unused)
Black= -5v (Ground)

And voila, the finished product –

I made the cord extra long since everything seems to be wireless these days and I don’t want to be limited to sitting 5 feet from a TV screen.

Finally, one of the most important steps – go to http://www.redcl0ud.com/ to download XBCD.  The most recent version is from 2005, but it is more than adequate.  After the quite download and install, you may need to reboot before pluging in your new gamepad and configuring it for an emulator.  XBCD actually includes a setup utility to configure and calibrate the controller.

Now it’s time for me to see how well the Dolphin emulator plays with this new gamepad…

This in itself seems like a decent idea – let users further customize their browsing experience and allow third party developers to contribute.  I am not altogether against the use of these add-ons, but for me, one of the main draws to Opera was the “out-of-the-box” functionality; everything just worked.  Mouse gestures, ad-blocking, an adequate password and bookmark manager.  And anyone familiar with Greasemonkey in Firefox knows how useful some of these scripts can be.  All Greasemonkey scripts are compatible with Opera with slight tweaking.  

I chose Opera as an alternative because it isn’t bloated, it isn’t bogged down with extraneous toolbars, and it syncs all my information with other Opera installations on different computers.  Even though I’m not totally against extensions, so far it just seems things like LastPass are clunky and superfluous.  But if this is what it takes for Opera to take a bigger share from the browser market, then I can live with this necessary evil.

If todays methods for marketing new acts was applied in the early days of Rock N Roll,  what legends would make the cut?   Groups like The Monkeys and The Hollies arent too far of a cry from “Making the Band”, but most musicians up until this digital age made it by either touring relentlessly or by heavy airplay on the long lost radio. (Disclaimer: I genuinely like both of these bands and the music they created, namely I’m Not Your Stepping Stone and Bus Stop, respectively. The point is that they were fabricated and pieced together like The Spice Girls.)

Would “Heavy Metal” have happened if todays PR applied 40 years ago? At some point or another, I’m sure something similar would have evolved, though probably not in the same manner. Sure, Led Zeppelin would still become the hard rock darlings, Jimmy Page was already popular with the Yardbirds, remember. Black Sabbath, though, were certainly before their time sonically, but right in the target era for promoters. What better way to draw a crowd than with the possibility the singer may be painted purple? It is pretty cool though that Tony Iommi has his two middle fingers chopped off.

Starting at 6 a.m.  this morning,  my phone started going crazy with text messages from an unfamiliar number,  10076200000, with the body of the message beginning with i9E554Hteq,  which means nothing to me.  The first reaction was to Google the number.   This lead me to two relevant links.   One,  on the XDA forums,  a user with the same issue was directed to look at a particular post on T-Mobiles forums.   The other relevant Google link went to the same place – several T-Mobile customers getting bombarded with sms from this same number.   Someone posted a link to a T-Mobile announcement by a forum moderator addressing this – basically it is caused by a SIM card improperly being setup for consumer email and causing TMo to send these faux messages.   The suggestion of this article was to call support to rectify.

My 1st call – Although hard to understand due to a foreign accent,  I explained my issue of having nearl 100 texts from a certain number,  Googling the number,  and being lead to the T-Mobile announcement advising customers to contact support for a fix.   Thinking he would at least ask someone if they were aware,  he instead asked me to call the number sending the messages and politely ask them to stop.   Immediately afterward,  he inquired if I needed anything else on my call today.   Well,  yes,  I explained again that it wasnt a phone number and that the forum post suggested it originated from them and asked if he wanted to body of the message.   He retorted that he wouldnt know what to do with it and to take the phone to a store for a fee.   No way,  the nearest store is an hour away and I’m no about to pay.   I then asked if there was any escalated tech support I could speak with and was denied,  being told that he could assist me.   Giving it another shot,  I recanted my story from the beginning and with the same results.   His resolution was for me to (somehow)  contact the originator of the problematic texts.

The 2nd call – After waiting several minutes,  I called and was received much better.   The woman genuinely seemed to understand my problem and appeared to at least be aware of this issue.   I spent the next 45 minutes troubleshooting,  holding,  and re-explaining.   Most of this call was unremarkable and what I would consider a typical customer service interaction.   Then,  out of nowhere,  she asks if I’ve tried lookong on the T-Mobile forums since they offer “a wealth of mobile phone knowledge”.   Hmm,  okay,  but those forums are where I found other users with this problem and the subsequent admin post informing us the issue is caused by SIM cards being improperly setup for consumer email.   Totally oblivious to me having said this,  she once again recommended I visit the forums.  I remained steadfast in my desire for a functioning phone,  thus prompting a lengthy hold.   She came back to inform me many other users were having the same issue (duh)  and that I would need to setup a new email account with my company.   Funny thing though I not only do not use corporate email on my phone,  but these messages were TEXT MESSAGES,  not emails.   The rep then said that she had made a change for me and to reboot my phone; she would call within 3-5 minutes to verify the issue has been resolved.

As I write this,  over an hour has passed and I’m still being bombarded by texts from 10076200000.