While it’s undoubtedly a cool and fun addition to any gaming setup, it’s only fair that we also look into some of the potential drawbacks. The controller boasts a shape reminiscent of the iconic Gibson Explorer guitar, giving it an authentic vibe that players love. USB cable that is great for playing from the couch, but is long and unwieldy when sitting at a desk. You’ll find two ‘Alps’ switches soldered to it, with the strum sat in a housing that’s slid into the body and four screws to secure it. To meet this need, Activision and RedOctane created the Xplorer Guitar, with its design drawing heavily from the iconic Gibson Explorer guitar.

Because Activision's proposed effects pedal never made it to production, there is no way of knowing what kind of signal the X-Plorer is expecting to receive.This is going to have a USB-C port, a USB header for connecting to the guitar’s main board, and the associated circuity to make everything function. When the sixth generation of video games consoles were released in the mid 2000s, console manufacturers began the process of transitioning from wired to wireless controllers. I also considered switching to a vertical USB-C port, which would help the vertical alignment significantly due to the added distance from the PCB to the center of the port. To play it a little safer I also added a 500 mA polyfuse so that I don’t accidentally overload the host port with my shenanigans.

I recently put together a library for interfacing Arduino development boards with sim racing devices such as shifters, pedals, and handbrakes.The colors are fully programable via the configurator program on pc so you can set them to whatever color you want! Because I was filming for YouTube at the time I wasn’t paying as close of attention as I should have and accidentally lifted half of the pad of the D- pin. If you yank on the USB cable in the wrong way it may bend or break the USB cable or the connector inside the guitar.

There’s a ~13 by 8 mm hole above the USB-C connector which needs to be filled to make the perimeter of the guitar look seamless. These come out easily with a few turns of a screwdriver, and then the back of the guitar lifts off with no resistance. its wired, so you dont have to worry about batteries, its one piece so it isnt as likely to have faulty connections, and less of them are known to be faulty in general. I didn’t bother with adding a removable connector for this since it’s unused anyways, but this is the one change that is not plug and play for reversing the mod (the wires would need to be stripped and re-soldered).These events bring together players and promote community and camaraderie among fans of music games. It would be just as well to add a captive nut or threaded insert to the standoff itself, but the standoff makes assembly a tad bit easier since it can be added or changed without removing the PCB from the guitar body.

These pickguards are quite delicate on the screw pegs at the back, so be very delicate when screwing it in, you shouldnt need to tighten the screws very much. This same controller was also bundled with Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock for the personal computer (PC) and Macintosh. If you don't select this option, you will not know if someone has responded to your comment unless you happen to revisit this post. In the middle of the board, just behind the two mounting points, I added a threaded standoff which is at the same height as the USB port.

All of the work in handling electrostatic discharge (ESD) should already be taken care of on the main PCB, so this little board just needs to convert the downstream USB-A port into a USB-C port. Until Activision decides to release its effects pedal, the connection will remain a useless feature of the guitar hero game.