Problem with Controller Adapter in Retroarch

[SiriusVI]

EDIT: Updated title of thread. Better description of the problem in second post.

Original post:

Hey everyone,

I know I should as this over at libretro, but I kind of hate the way their forum is structured, so I'm hoping that someone here can help me out. I've run into a weird bug today and it happened to me three times, so something must be wrong.

So, for some reason, sometimes, in circumstances unknown to me, my controllers stop working in RetroArch. Retroarch still recognizes the controllers and maps them to users 1, 2, 3 and so on, but when I press buttons on the controllers, nothing happens, not in games, not in the Retroarch menu. Nothing fixes it. I've tried resetting retroarch cofig file, deleting the autoconfig folder, unplugging my usb controllers. Nothing works.

The controllers still work in windows device calibration, Launchbox and other emulators, such as SNES9x. But they won't work in Retroarch.

The only "fix" is restarting windows. Does anyone have any idea what could cause this? This NEVER happened to me over the last 2 years and today it happened 3 times. The only thing that changed is that I recently added a mayflash SNES to USB controller adapter to connect 2 original SNES controllers to USB, but I don't think these are the problem, since all controllers work fine until they don't, and once this error happens, no controller works, not the Snes controllers, not the XBOS One controllers. Only keyboard and mouse continue working.

Edited August 28, 2021 by SiriusVI

[SiriusVI]

Hey, so after some trial and error, I found out what the problem is and it has to do with the Mayflash adapter afterall, kind of.

Turns out the Mayflash adapters are viewed by Windows as XBOX 360 controllers and that interfered with my real wireless Xbox one controllers

So I thought I'd just use the handy device reorder app (https://github.com/briankendall/devreorder) to change the order Retroarch will see the controllers. That way, whenever I plug in the SNES controllers, Retroarch will load these first instead of the Xbox one controllers. 

Devicereorder works fine , too. When I launch Retroarch with the new order, the Mayflash adapter is loaded before the Xbox One controller. So far so good.

However, it still does not work, because, even though the Mayflash adapter is engaged as Port 1, whenever the Xbox controller is switched on, IT will control Port 1. For some reason, Retroarch thinks that the XBOX One controller is the Mayflash adapter. In User Controlls in Port 1 it says "Mayflash ...", but it is controlled by the Xbox wireless controller, even though the wireless controller is loaded in Port 3

I tried hiding the Xbox Controllers altogether in devicereorder, but it doesn't work, because Retroarch thinks that MAyflash is Xbox. That means, even though Retroarch does not even load the xbox wireless controller, it still controls User Port 1 which the Mayflash adapter is assigned to.

There is no simple solution to this problem that I found, because even if I start Retroarch and then disconnect the Xbox One controller, Retroarch will not give back controls to the gamepads actually connected to the Mayflash adapter.

The only sort-of-workaround I found is disconnecting all controllers, starting Retroarch with mouse and keyboard and then once Retroarch is launched, plug in the mayflash adapters.

[SiriusVI]

Well, I'm really frustrated with this, so I decided to order this adapter and see if it behaves differently: https://www.raphnet-tech.com/products/snes2usb_2player_adapter_v2/index.php