A new controller drift fix has arrived — the Heller Drift Stick Fix is here, and it looks like it has a lot of promise for being a permanent solution to your PlayStation and Xbox controllers drifting.
Controller drift (or stick drift) is an issue that has plagued analog sticks for quite some time now. Whether you have a PlayStation, Xbox, or Nintendo Switch, you or someone you know has likely encountered this problem: your controller will cause movement on its own even though the analog stick is not being touched.
Drifting can be pretty annoying, but a new controller mod called the "Helder Drift Stick Fix" promises to fix the problem — check out this video from Macho Nacho Productions that shows off how the Helder Drift Stick Fix works!
How the Helder Drift Stick Fix Works
The Helder Drift Stick Fix works by compensating for a problem with a key component of modern controllers: the potentiometer. This small hardware mod could very well be a permanent controller drift fix.
A potentiometer is a variable resistor that can be adjusted using a slider. For example, a potentiometer could be used in a light switch to control the brightness of a light by raising or lowering the amount of electricity that is fed to the fixture. Modern controllers use two potentiometers to measure the movement on the X-axis and the Y-axis.
The problem, however, is that potentiometers can eventually start to break down. In terms of a controller, this means that they're not as accurate anymore — and that's how controller drift starts.
The Helder Drift Stick Fix takes care of this issue in a rather novel way by placing a pair of adjustable pieces on the circuit board of your controller. After installation, you simply need to use a calibration website to measure your controller's drift and adjust the mechanism to bring it back to dead center. If the problem returns, you can open up your controller and adjust things again.
Is This Controller Drift Fix Permanent?
As a hardware mod, this controller drift fix could be a permanent solution to the problem. Potentiometer wear is a fact of life, but the ability to manually recalibrate your analog sticks through the Helder Drift Stick Fix would let you remedy the issue pretty easily.
There are, however, a number of challenges. Aside from having to buy the kit, you'll also need to be able to solder it to the circuit board. That means you won't just need to buy Helder's controller drift fix kit — you're going to need to buy a good soldering iron and some solder, too.
This kit doesn't work with Nintendo Switch Joy-Cons, either, although I've had a fair amount of success using WD-40 Contact Cleaner spray to fix Joy-Con drift. As the website notes, this kit hasn't been tested with Pro and Elite controllers just yet, either, so there are no guarantees on that front — and you're going to have to do all of the installation yourself or pay someone else to do it.
You can buy the Helder Drift Stick Fix at Helder's Game Tech for $15.00 or your regional equivalent; make sure to check out Macho Nacho Productions' video on the kit to see how it works and how to install it. Keep in mind, any hardware controller mods you do are at your own risk!
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What do you think of Helder's controller drift fix? Do you think hardware companies should do more to permanently fix the problem of analog stick drift in the first place? Let us know in the comments below!
