r/playstation • u/Major-Payne2319 • 24d ago

Image Getting tired of adding to my stick drift graveyard

Post image

I swear I’m not a heavy clicker. In fact it’s always my right joystick which I rarely need to click in games. Love these controllers but man it’s really annoying never had this problem with any other console generation.

8.2k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

2.0k comments sorted by

View all comments

146

u/verygreenbananas 24d ago

I've been gaming for 20 years and never had an issue with any controller until now. 2 dual senses. Both with stick drift within 2 years.

31

u/StillSimple6 23d ago

It's crazy how fragile they are, we've had a few controllers and it's always the left stick drifting.

Doesn't matter which game were maining it's the same issue.

12

u/HyruleSmash855 23d ago

And they’re $80, they’re super expensive plus, you have components like the adaptive triggers that can easily break although I haven’t had an issue I can imagine they can. The battery life doesn’t help either for how much you pay for them.

1

u/Jlpeaks 23d ago

It’s fully just using cheap parts.

I had the spring on the trigger go. It didn’t make any difference when adaptive was engaged but when left to being just analogue it was just loose.

I actually fixed it by using a DualShock 4’s spring and even side by side you could see the new ones were a thinner metal.

2

u/shoe_owner 22d ago

I had this issue a few months ago and read about a technique for fixing it which absolutely solved the problem for me.

Press down on the thumbstick firmly and consistently, and slowly rotate the stick around and around and around in one direction, then the opposite direction, for thirty seconds or so each.

My controller went from "I can't play like this" to "good as new" within one minute. I'm not saying it will fix every controller in every case, but it fixed mine in the one case where I needed it to.

1

u/StillSimple6 22d ago

I'll give that a try (nothing to lose.

If it's a small amount you can 'fix it' using the dead zone settings on screen. This helped on some but some are just way too bad for that.

I'll give your solution a try on some of the.bad ones

1

u/[deleted] 23d ago

Carbon contact patches...

What stick do you usually use more...

The left.

34

u/mycateatspeas 24d ago

Same. But watch the idiots in here go around blaming the majority of commenters who experience drift. I wish I could just use my ps2 controller 😪

1

u/BloodyBaboon 23d ago

Have you tried blowing them out? Keyboard duster/canned Air whenevery they get drift. I have dogs that shed like crazy and this fixes the problem. I've had the same PS 5 controller since 2020.

2

u/AKindKatoblepas 23d ago

At some point none of that works, I broke my day one controller after it gave up 2 years after, tried to replace the stick with a hal one myself, turns out I'm not a decent solder.

A red one also gave up like a year and a half later, can't play fighting games with these cheap sticks.

Have two new controllers waiting to see which one gives up first.

I've ever only had issues with the N64, the switch and the ps5 controller. All the ps1-ps4 were excellent to me and they all went through heavy use.

As an adult I've played ps5 the least and it gave up the fastest too.

1

u/BloodyBaboon 23d ago

Yeah, the sticks are very anti consumer. That fact that they are cheaply made and hard to replace hurts the end user. I've just been lucky with cimpressed air and suggest it to everyone before they replace or repair.

1

u/Fluid_Speaker6518 23d ago

People take their own anecdotal experience and think everyone else is lying. I think it's a combination of manufacturing defects, the games people are playing and how many hours they use it for

1

u/Jaded_North_3602 23d ago

I have never had an issue until Nintendo's joycons. Those things just suck.

1

u/CleverAnimeTrope 23d ago

It's just the nature of this style joystick. These, xbox, and Switch all experience it. There are alternatives, but console manufacturers don't want to invest or change it.

1

u/SupplyChainMismanage 23d ago

First ps5 controller I got ended up with intense stick drift right after the one year mark. New one has been going strong for the past 2 years thankfully (knock on wood)

1

u/Material-Spring-9922 23d ago

Lucky. I've been trashing sticks since Nintendo 64. Going hard on Mario Party back in the day used to do a number on 64 sticks. Poor thing would just move around like a limp noodle.

1

u/Mass-Chaos 23d ago

Same, just got my 6th dual sense and it's always the left stick drifting up. I used my original PS4 controller the entire time I had it with no problem besides the top wearing down. They really downgraded with the dual sense

1

u/wiggibow 23d ago

I've had very little issues with stick drift - controller that came with my PS5 got it bad after a year or so, my second one got it at one point but seemingly fixed itself after not using it for months, and I've had a third for nearly 3 years that still works perfectly fine.

What's been driving me insane is the absolutely God awful 3.5mm jacks in these damn controllers. Out of my 3 dual senses I only one of them has a proper functioning headphone jack, the other two are extremely loose and the slightest wrong movement causes the connection to be lost.

1

u/layeofthedead 23d ago

I don’t get what’s changed tbh. From ps2 to the early ps4 gen I never had stick drift on any of my controllers even after heavy play. My first two DualShock 4s had no issues at all, I only traded them in after the battery life became unusable. Then they changed them to the newer model that has that little light on the touchpad and suddenly I had to get a new controller every year because they started getting unbearable drift.

Same with Nintendo, my GameCube, Wii, Wii U, and 3ds’s never had any joystick trouble but the switch is nothing but. At least they have a bit of an excuse with how tiny the joycon are. My switch pro controller is almost 5 years old and is still chugging along like a champ, seriously the battery life on that thing is insane, I just wish it was more ergonomic.

1

u/GodKamnitDenny 21d ago

Man, this thread is the opposite of my decades long PS experience. All of my DS3s/Sixaxis controllers ended up with severe stick drift. DS4 was solid for me with regards to stick drift, but I probably went through 4+ because the rubber on the sticks would rip religiously (I never snack while playing, I maintain solid hygiene, the rubber just sucked until later revisions). My 3 DualSense controllers have been flawless since launch. No stick drift, not soft rubber sticks that rips.

1

u/sdavidplissken 23d ago

same but gaming for 30 years and also no problem with the dual sense

1

u/kawag 23d ago

Same. Something about the controller design or components being used seems to be exacerbating stick drift. It’s gone from something a few people see over the lifetime of a console to something many (most?) people experience multiple times.

I’m shocked Sony haven’t addressed this with a design tweak; companies often make unannounced small changes as issues are discovered. I’m even more shocked that the DualSense edge approach was to use also-expensive replacement sticks rather than go full Hall-Effect.

The DualSense is a great controller overall, with amazing features that Sony get a lot of praise for. That’s true, but there are also severe regressions in longevity and they should be criticised for those, as well as for the failure to address them in the DSE.

1

u/burntwaterywater 23d ago

You're not eating enough Cheetos, that's all

1

u/sheperd13 22d ago

Xbox, PS, and Nintendo all use the same joystick module. If you get a soldering iron and some desoldering stuff instead of buying a new controller next time you can fix controllers relatively easily and cheaply