sticky rubber grips on gamepad

[Tempest]

I have an old, expensive gamepad with rubber grips. The gamepad is at least 5 years old. It has been functioning fine and having the same consistent grip over the years. Recently, I've been playing Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 with the cheap but durable Logitech F310, which is well over 10 years old and all smooth plastic. I had to use the F310 to remap the keyboard controls to the gamepad because Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 lack native support for gamepads.

Today, I noticed an update to Atari Vault and played some DLC with the expensive gamepad. Unfortunately, the rubber grips are now a bit sticky. Apparently this is a relatively common problem, where rubber degenerates and becomes sticky over time. I thought maybe it was because I didn't use it in a few months. There are all sorts of ways to try to remove the stickiness ranging from baking soda to xylene, but this issue makes me want to just use cheap plastic controllers from now on.

The F310 is fine except it lacks rumble. I paid a lot of money for the gamepad with rubber grips. Such a bummer. I'll probably try to clean it and if it doesn't clean then I'll give up.

[Tempest]

I agree. This makes me wonder if cheapo gamepads are better than expensive ones.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

The wireless logitech game pads are very nice and can be found rather cheap nowa days

[Tempest]

I like wired because I don't want to deal with batteries and I always worry about lag. Any lag with the F710?

[Snow]

Modern BT controllers have the polling rate of 1000, which is exactly the same as USB polling rate. And in some cases like DS4 bluetooth can have even less input latency for whatever weird reason, here are some tests.
I'm not sure what F710's polling rate is, so it might be not identical to wired connection, yet still the difference is not going to be noticeable. F710 is definitely the best all-round option if you don't want to go with DS3/DS4 controllers, IMO even better than X360 controller.

[Tempest]

Interesting. There is that dongle for the F710 that has to be dealt with, as well but I could get used to it. I do have several Logitech products and they are all durable.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Yes F710 comes with its own usb wireless dongle. Yes they are good reliable controllers. It was definitely a good option compared to trying to get a DS3 controller to work properly in everything back when F710 and X360 controllers were becoming more common choices. As many controllers on tge market at that time were not always easy to install or had issues due to many games basically not liking a controller that wasn't 360 type.

F710 was probably the easiest wireless controller to get working in pretty much any game where a controller can be used. And it is seen just like an Xbox controller which helps greatly. And of course even games that may not natively support a controller, can usually still be configured to work thanx to Steam BigPictureMode controller rebinding ability

[Snow]

What Motha said. F710 works via XInput, which is a library almost every game uses to communicate with controllers, so it's not just seen as X360 controller, it is one on software level.
I personally am a big fan of Sony controllers, mostly because of best DPADs ever, and I use my DS3 and DS4 via SCP drivers to avoid any compatibility issues - SCP drivers hide my controllers from system and re-route any inputs to virtual X360 controllers.

[Tempest]

If the dongle is lost or malfunctions, can the F710 still be used?

[Snow]

It can be paired to any BT dongle via F710 connection utility.

[Tempest]

Oh that's good.

[Tempest]

There is a Logitech F510 that has everything that I want, the form factor of the F310, wired, plus rumble, but unfortunately there are reported problems with the rubber grips degenerating and the product was discontinued.

[Tempest]

Interestingly, I came back to the expensive gamepad, today, after it was stored in the exact same place, by the window. The rubber is no longer sticky at all. I wonder if the change in the weather somehow reverted the rubber back to its native state? I didn't do any cleaning of the rubber or anything.

[Grimy_RIck]

引用自 Tempest：

Interestingly, I came back to the expensive gamepad, today, after it was stored in the exact same place, by the window. The rubber is no longer sticky at all. I wonder if the change in the weather somehow reverted the rubber back to its native state? I didn't do any cleaning of the rubber or anything.

Maybe it was your hands that where sticky and not the controller

[Tempest]

Definitely the controller.

[_I_]

or gave the controller to a 4yr old for a few minutes