So yeah! It’s finally complete, thanks to retropie and the controlblock! Took me a lot of hard work, but I’m happy as hell with it.

My goal was to create a SNES pi console that retained the clean look and gave me functionality above and beyond what I would get if I bought a similar console pre-made from the store.

Features:

– Runs the Retropie/Emulationstation OS
– Bluetooth integrated. Programmed to support PS3, PS4, HID and Wii/U controllers natively.
– Wireless N integrated for remote control and file transfer. Can be operated via phone or SSH.
– 16GB internal storage, NAS functionality via WLAN for external storage, streaming video, films and music.
– Support for NES, SNES, GBA, PSX, Megadrive/Genesis, GB, GBC, Arcade, Neo Geo, CPS1/2/3, Amiga and more all at full speed, all navigated through purely with a SNES pad or supported controller.
– Support for two real SNES pads via the front ports, up to 4 controllers configured at once.

Ingredients

Hardware:
– SNES Console (bought one with a broken motherboard)
– Raspberry Pi B 2
– 16GB Micro SD
– OEM Bluetooth dongle
– TP-Link WiFi N dongle
– HDMI Extension lead
– Micro USB extension lead
– ControlBlock circuitry for polling the real SNES ports and controlling the LED and power switch
– Solder, wire and a new LED.

Installation

I firstly started by installing Retropie and getting everything set up correctly, using the great guide at https://github.com/retropie/RetroPie-Setup/wiki – for a lot of people some of the more advanced settings may seem daunting, but I have enough linux experience to have a grasp on it all. Kinda.

The next step was to work out where everything went. I disassembled the console, and installed the USB and HDMI extension cables on the rear plate for power and video in/out. The adapters fitted into the slots with minimal filing/sanding, only requiring a bit of glue to keep them firmly in place. My plan to not alter the casing itself (apart from that removable plate) paid off in the end. The entire console is seamless and looks no different to a stock SNES (which was the point) and if the ports do break somehow in the future, the plate is easily replaceable and the Pi is not compromised in any way.

The next step was to solder the connections for the controller ports ready for installation into the controlblock for polling inputs. I de-soldered the original control PCB from the ports and attached wires. I wasn’t sure how many I would use until I got the circuitry to test them out – I ended up getting rid of half! Four of the pins didn’t even need to be used – I only needed 5v, clock, data, ground and latch.

And here is the image of how the wiring ended up when connected and installed to the control unit, along with the new LED and power switch connection:

As for mounting the Pi, I used four plastic spacers, glued to the base.

So really, that was it for the install. I made all the wires and components fit, plugged in the bluetooth and WiFi dongles and put the case back together again. After installing the controlblock service via sudo get-apt via the github repository, the console switched on and off as it was intended to via the power switch and the LED worked fine. However, there was a serious issue with polling the data for the SNES pads. Whilst it worked fine on the lowest clock setting, having it even close to Pi2 overclock (1ghz, 0 overvolt) resulted in random button presses and eventually a failure of the controller to be recognised at all….so I brought it up as an issue with the retropie team, and it was identified as a clock issue and fixed within a day. Awesome.

And like that, my console was finished:

But something was missing – yes, even more crazy extras that I probably neednt have bothered with. I bought this controller by 8bitdo – it’s a fantastic replica of the SNES original pad, and works via Bluetooth:

A little bit of coding later, and I had written a driver and set it up to work automatically upon boot!

As mentioned, it is configured to work and connect at boot automatically and then the front ports are set to player 2 and 3 for multiplayer. A PS3 or Wii U Pro Controller can be added for player 4 if I want some bomberman action!

So yeah. everything is controlled via the SNES pad. Quitting a game is a case of pressing SELECT+START together, or in the case of Game Boy games, I have set it to SELECT+L (because of the crazy Link’s Awakening save system).

What do you all think? good?

I have two USB gamepads both branded Retrolink. They are both recognized in ES. They both pass the jstest. They are both set up in retroarch. I installed beta 3.2 on two different pi’s. 1 was a b+ the other a b2 (each with their correct images). Same condition on both Pi’s. If I set the two up in different orders the problem switches between controllers.

I tried two different NES emulators and a SNES. Same issue.

I tried deleting all the configs as I’ve seen elsewhere on the forums and then resetting up the controllers, no joy.

The config is USBGamepad.cfg

Any ideas?

Hi Everyone,

I have 2 NES and 2 SNES controllers that I have converted to USB using the RetroKit from RetroUSB. The controllers work great but I find I have to remap the controllers every time I switch from NES to SNES or vice versa. Is there a way to have RetroPie and emulators detect that I have switched controllers and to load/use the appropriate mapping config file? Or is it possible to have multiple mappings saved and quickly select the appropriate mapping?

Thanks in advance!

I have big performance Problems with my Raspberry Pi 2.0
Using retropie v3.0 (sd image)

i have connected:
usb controller and wireless keyboard

SNES games run poorly with bad sound and low fps (for example Mario, super metroid, F zero)

I don´t understand that because I saw a lot of videos of people running even starfox or n64 games fluidly

I´ve already set the clock to the raspi 2 setting, everything else is left default.

I´m new to RetroPie and hope someone can help me.

Two suggestions based on a couple ‘issues’ I ran into over the weekend. Hopefully these aren’t duplicates or requests.

1. I would love to be able to be able to DELETE roms using the USB ROM copy service. Say I add 9 new ROMs to my RetroPie, but only 7 of them work. Now I’m stuck with two ROMs on the machine that don’t work. In some cases, the machine not be available to operate locally with a connected keyboard, or SSH in. Maybe a subfolder called DELETE where the ROM file desired to be deleted could be placed. If it matches the file on RetroPie in name and size, delete it from both locations (to avoid clutter). Say I built a machine for a not-very-computer-literate friend who wants to put more ROMs on. That’s simple enough for them with the great USB ROM copy service – until they put MAME roms in the Atari7800 folder or vice-versa, and then I have to go running over there to take them off the list manually.

2. I see that some config files are pulled down the USB still and have folders for FROM and TO (don’t have it in front of me at work, sorry). How about being able to do the same thing with the configs/(each emulator)/*.cfg files? That way, in the absence of both a network connection and a keyboard, I can still modify these files?

I know, I get the irony of the whole thing, but over the weekend, I had a new test system with me to use as an arcade on the hotel’s TV. But it was setup for different controllers, and I had no way to log in to change them (but I did have my laptop with me so I could have off the USB stick).

Thank you,

Hi,

Brand new to all this.

I have a Raspberry Pi 2
Retropie 3.0 Beta installed via SD card
Speedlink Strike Wired Gamepad
USB Keyboard

I’ve been following these instructions on lifehacker:
http://lifehacker.com/how-to-turn-your-raspberry-pi-into-a-retro-game-console-498561192

I got as far as booting up the Pi with my gamepad connected. The gamepad configuration screen appears and it lets me press the keys for each command, but then won’t do anything else. After the final button has been set, the menu moves back to the top, with the command for ‘UP’ highlighted, but it is frozen there. I can’t move to the ‘ok’ button, and the keyboard doesn’t seem to let me do anything except exit using F4 and starting the process again.

Help would be appreciated!

Hi everyone,

I am having trouble getting retropie version 3 betta for the raspberry pi 2 to download the roms folder to the usb drive. I have gone through the set up, enabled the USB rom service (326), made a retropie folder on the flash drive, and I’m leaving my flash drive in for well over 30 seconds. I’ve tried reformatting my flash drive; nothing. I tried re-writing retropie to the SD card; nothing. I have no idea what to do at this point, seeing as how all of the help videos say to just plug the usb in and it downloads automatically, which I’ve seen it do on other systems. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Hi,

I’ve been using RetroPie to play Final Fantasy VIII (PSX), which requires you to hold down the select button and press square during some sequences. Currently, I’m unable to do this because the select button on the PS3 controller works as a toggle key to allow me to do stuff like exit the emulator (e.g. select + start exits the emulator).

Is there any way to assign the toggle key to a different button on the controller (e.g. R3) so that I can use the select button normally?

Thanks a lot to anyone who could assist. My info is below, and the input section of my retroarch config file is attached, if either helps.

Pi Model: 2B
RetroPie Version Used: 3.0 beta 2
Built From: SD image
Controller used: PS3 controller, have also set up Tomee USB SNES pad
How to replicate the problem: Playing Final Fantasy VIII using RetroPie, summon a GF and attempt to boost by holding the select button and pressing square.

Hi, how can I run the roms in my usb without copying they to the sd?
I saw this tutorial: http://mardell.me/blog/how-to-load-roms-from-a-usb-drive-on-retropie/
But I don’t want to change the directories.

Thanks

Hi, I’m using RetroPie 3 (over OSMC with RetroPie Script).

I have a dual-shock like (not dual-shock) controller and after first boot (and splash screen with controller configuration for ES) lot of systems goes OK. All fine! Until I test PSX.

First of all, the analog doesn’t works. Ok, reading the forum I added to:
/opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch-core-options.cfg the line pcsx_rearmed_pad1type = “analog”
Check that the path is “/all/” not “/psx/” because this doesn’t work.

Ok, now I have analog detection! But not all fine. I detected that left analog “up” is not correctly calibrated (so is like half up) and, worst, the right analog is misconfigured (checked in Ape Scape).

I executed “RetroPie (menu) -> configure retroarch controller” and it generates the file:
/opt/retropie/emulators/retroarch/configs/MicrontekUSBJoystick.cfg
It doesn’t work, I try executing again the configurator but modifiying other keys (swap up and down, left and right, etc.) and nothing changed, up is still up in a game (tested in SNES games, for example).

The script says that my “MicrontekUSBJoystick.cfg” will be used when my controller is detected, but is fake, this file isn’t readed (or is readed and overwrited)

How can I configure my controls?

I updated retropie from source. I use a USB controller. Afterwards, found all my settings for my hotkeys still work for the SNES emulator and everything is fine.

But then I checked my retroarch config…both the “all” and the SNES specific, and a couple ones that weren’t labeled as other emulators.

None of them had the hotkey setup, nor any of my settings. I had read the configurations would get overwritten, so I was surprised to find my save/load state buttons still worked. Now I’m concerned as to where it’s getting its commands from.

Any ideas where else to look?

Hello all newbie here,

I am having issues with my N64 roms on Retropie, everytime I try to play a game it is horribly choppy and the sound will cut out randomly. Also most text dialogues are unreadable. My super nintendo Roms work fine, which leads me to believe it may be a proformence issue

here are some additional details
Pi Model: 2b
RetroPie Version Used: 3.0.0 Beta
Built From: SD Image
USB Devices connected: Steelseries 3gc controller
Controller used: same as above

Guide used: http://lifehacker.com/how-to-turn-your-raspberry-pi-into-a-retro-game-console-498561192
Followed this guide, but instead of using wifi to transfer my roms I transfered them through a Flashdrive

I’ve tried overclocking and such. Anyone have any suggestions?

Hello, it’s very hard for me to properly configure the n64 controller. (English is not my first langage)
I may be wrong but I believe this config is wrong: /opt/retropie/emulators/retroarch/configs/USB_Gamepad.cfg

The file look like this:
input_device = “USB Gamepad ”
input_driver = “udev”
input_b_btn = “2”
input_y_btn = “3”
input_select_btn = “8”
input_start_btn = “9”
input_up_axis = “-1”
input_down_axis = “+1”
input_left_axis = “-0”
input_right_axis = “+0”
input_a_btn = “1”
input_x_btn = “0”
input_l_btn = “4”
input_r_btn = “5”

input_enable_hotkey_btn = “8”
input_exit_emulator_btn = “9”
input_menu_toggle_btn = “0”
input_load_state_btn = “4”
input_save_state_btn = “5”

Hello. i have some very hard problem. Im try to used all 3 gamepads.
1. USB Keyboard, 2. XBOX 360 Wirelles PAD and 3. Db9_GPIO_RPI as Amiga Joystick.

All working in EMULATION STATION and Amiga joystick working in UAE4ALL and ATARI 800 but in all LIBRETRO emus my XBOX PAD is always configured as GAMEPAD #2 but in ES i see as GAMEPAD #3.

When dissable my db9_gpio_rpi (Amiga Joystick) when my XBOX 360 PAD is in ES as #2 when enbale db9_gpio_rpi XBOX 360 PAD is in ES as #3. Where i can change the # of gamepad or change db9_gpio_rpi (Amiga Joystick) to gamepad #3.

Thankyou for help :)

cheers