Picked this up at Wal-Mart yesterday for 14.95 USD. It’s a (new?) Sony-branded budget PS2 controller without rumble motors. I haven’t seen this before and couldn’t find any existing info on it. Besides the missing motors it’s somewhat different internally than previous DS2 pads I’ve seen.

Cracking the case open reveals a couple interesting things. Holsters for the rumble motors are present but empty, and the ribbon cable from the button membrane is no longer directly attached to the PCB.

The ribbon ‘cable’ is loosely held in place by 2 plastic standoffs jutting through the PCB, but no real contact is made until the controller casing is screwed closed. There’s a gray rubberized pad opposite the PCB-to-ribbon contacts that is pressed tightly against the PCB when the case is sealed, completing the circuit.

Kind of a neat idea I guess. Annoying if you were intending to keep the circuit sheet attached to the PCB after removing it from the case. There is a resistor in-line with the circuit sheet between the d-pad/button common and one of the PCB contacts (same as the DS2), so if you remove it you’ll need to wire one back in.

The actual button contacts have been moved from directly underneath each button to behind the printed circuit sheet; now contact is made by mashing the button membrane into the sheet, which in turn presses down into the contact pad.

The PCB itself looks pretty typical aside of the ribbon contact area.

http://kdraper.fastmail.fm/pub/padhacking/scph-10520/pcb_back_small.jpg

That about wraps it up.

Btw, does anyone know offhand what value the resistor is in the button-facing circuit sheet on the DS2? The ones on the sixaxis are supposed to be 4.7k, but I’m getting over 6 on my cheap multimeter, so I don’t trust what I’m seeing for this pad.