Original subtitles

[Music]

hi and welcome to bites and bits if you

do a lot of gaming it's important to

have a good quality game controller so

the people at gam sir have sent me

across one of their new G7 H game

controllers to have a bit of a play with

now this controller here it boosts um

hall effect sensors for its analog

controls so that's for the both the

joysticks and the triggers and then it

uses micro switches for the various

buttons so that should give it a good

quality premium fa now this one retails

at around about 40 to 50 or $40 to $50

so it is sort of at the top end of um

the game controller market so let's have

a look at what we get and if it's

actually worth the

money so if we open up the box then so

get inside

here we'll find we have the actual

controller itself so if I just take this

stuff out of

here so we have our controller and in

the Box we get um some

stickers we get a manual and we get a 1

month Xbox games pass and then of course

we have our USBC cable so those are

really the important things that we need

to get this um device up and

running so let's have a look at the

actual controller itself then so this

controller does retail for between sort

of 40 and 50 depending on where you're

going to buy it from and I think I think

dollar-wise it's pretty much the same so

$40 to

$50 so it it it would be sort of class

as a fairly premium device so we are

expecting it then to be a fairly premium

feel to it first impressions um the

weight of it is is is pretty much ideal

actually it's not too light it's not too

heavy it just feels nice in the hand it

feels um sort chunky enough but but not

um too too heavy or anything like that

the grip itself we do have a textured

area here on both um grips so where

where your pams are sitting and your

fingers are fitting that that really

does add to the the security of it it

feels very sort of nice in the hand

there not just not going to move around

or slip or slide as as you as you play

your

games button wise um one of the big

selling points for this of course is

that it has um micro switches for number

of buttons so if I click this button

here hopefully you can hear that

clicking away so so these actually do

have proper micro switches behind them

quite a lot of these joysticks use um

PCB pads and as you press the button

down it sort of squeezes a conductor

material between the pads to make the

connection and that's where you get

quite a spongy feel on S of lower

quality buttons where these here are are

really good um they're very positive and

you really do know if you are pressing

it or not so so that's a real bonus on

here and again one of the selling points

for this device the d-pad itself then uh

again that has got little push buttons

behind them I don't think those are

micro switches um but again if you if

you you can hopefully hear that just

sort of clicking through I I I do play a

lot of retro games so things like

Pac-Man and Donkey Kong where you do

need sort of like a four-way joystick

and this d-pad here I I do find is about

about one of the best I've I've seen for

that particular function it is it is it

gives you a very positive directional

fail on here and again some other games

that I play with it the the diagonals

again are very easy to do as well so um

a very good d-pad again from my point of

view the other controls then again are

our shoulder buttons those are again on

on little push buttons but they do have

a nice feel to them very positive and

the analog controls are are very smooth

actually I I do like the feel for these

they do feel very high quality and again

one of the selling aspects of this is

that the analog um controls so both

joysticks and the um shoulder or trigger

buttons are all using hall effect

switches or hall effect sensors and

again I'll I'll talk more about what

that means in a second but it does mean

that um these are going to give you much

better control um over time they AR they

aren't going to degrade over time and

again I I'll explain why that isn't in a

second other features of it then again

we do have um some media control so

there's a little M button here we hold

that in and we then have volume control

on our d-pad and then our iname uh voice

chat control as well on there on the

back we do have a headset Jack plug here

so if you want to connect up a headset

wired headset you can just plug it in

here so you have everything just running

off a single USB cable and we do have

our heads or our microphone mute button

there as well so if we look at the back

of the device we'll actually find there

are two extra buttons on here now these

are mappable buttons for the controller

so what this allows you to do is to map

one of the buttons on the front one of

the main buttons

to either of these buttons down here so

you can have two extra buttons down the

bottom which will mimic something up

here so say you wanted to have an extra

fire button down down below you could

map this button to your a button so when

you press this button underneath it will

in fact press the a button or and again

any any combination of those

factors so that's pretty much all the

aspects on the controller itself um

again there are couple of other buttons

here which um help it help us set it up

and calibrate it and so on but again

I'll take you to that in a second as

well so so overall then um I I am really

pleased to be honest with the feel of

this controller uh and have again I

already have had a go playing with it

and it does feel really good to play um

again I'm not a a a massive expert on on

gaming um so uh obviously I'm doing just

from a general sort of being able to use

it and how it feels in a game and I say

I I think from what I have at the moment

um sort of orig Xbox controllers and

other sort of um other third party Xbox

controllers um I I would say this is

probably the best one I have at the

moment so I'm very very pleased with

that but let's have a look more then at

um the actual features of this and and

why it would be classed in as a premium

product and why you are paying slightly

more for it and then of course how it

plays in

games so let's first look at the idea

then of these hall effect sensors and

and why those are better and and why

they are on this premium device again

you'll find a lot of the more premium

devices these days are using these hall

effect sensors for their analog controls

so let's find out a bit more about

that so if we first have a look at how a

normal potentiometer based controller

works so potentiometer is effectively a

little variable resistor and that's what

um is inside the actual joystick

controller when you move the um

joysticks around and what's really

happen happening is that we are creating

what's known as potential divider so

it's very much similar to this little

preset um potentiometer that I have here

so basically we have two terminals which

we apply power to so 5 volts to one end

Z volts to the other and the this one

there you can just about see underneath

this metal bit there's a little carbon

track there and that carbon track is a

resistor um or resist of material so

between this terminal and this terminal

we have 1 kilo

of

resistance what we then have is a slider

here so you can see that the point of

the slider here is actually touching

against that carbon track and what this

allows us to do then is that little

slider there a as it moves around in

effect what it's doing is it's taking

this full track of 1K and dividing it

into two resistors so a resistance from

here to this point and resistance from

here to this this point and that gives

us our potential divider and that will

take our 5V power supply divide it up

into two parts and give us a a center

voltage which will change as we move the

potentiometer around and that's what's

happening so as you move your joystick

in effect what you're doing is moving

this little slider across a carbon track

and that gives a varying voltage then

back to your computer which tells it

which position your potentiometer is in

now of course the problem with these is

that this little slider is physically

moving and dragging across this carbon

track So eventually as you use the

joystick more and more that carbon tract

starts to get worn away and that causes

it then to start to give you um varying

readings so as certain bits of it get

worn the resistance changes and that's

that's where things like your um

joystick drift come into play where

perhaps although it's in the center

position here it's not actually

registering as a center anymore because

wear and tear on the carbon

itself so in our hall effect sensor what

we're doing is we're taking a little Joy

this is sort like a just a little

separate joystick sensor here and as you

can see if you look at this little bit

here that's the actual potentiometer and

as you can see as I move the joystick we

have a little um Center Point here which

is moving and that's the actual um

slider rubbing against the carbon what

we're going to do is we're going to

replace this resistance-based um sensor

with a magne IC sensor and we'll

effectively have a little magnet like

one of these um these are from another

project where we can actually um turn

one of these sensors into a hall effect

sensor but we B basically put a magnet

in on that rotating part and as that we

rotate the joystick that magnet will

rotate and then allow us to sense the

position of it using magnetic induction

and that will then we can translate that

sensor um position into a voltage which

can then be fed back to our PC to give

us our joystick position but of course

the upshot of that then is that there

are no wearing Parts as regards the

actual sensor so that wear and tear of

the wiper rubbing against the carbon

track is removed with simply this

magnetic induction process so obviously

all of the other mechanical parts of the

joystick the the knob and the springs

and so on like that are as they ever

were but the actual sensing part and the

voltage getting back out of this sensor

is not going to vary over time um it's a

much more reliable

process now as we're using hall effect

sensors for the joysticks and the

triggers they do need to be calibrated

the very first time that you use the

device so to do that we simply hold down

the three buttons at the top here so our

menu button our view button and our Xbox

button and then we connect it to our

computer now what we should find then is

once we get that in is that our white

indicator light here starts flashing and

that means that we are in calibration

mode so first off we need to tell it

where these zero positions are so none

of our sensors are being touched we

press the A Button white light goes out

and what we now do is we now cycle all

of the controls so our trigger buttons

in and

out and then our joysticks just simply

give them a full range of

motion once we've done that we press our

a button our White light comes on and

our joystick is now calibrated now we do

need to after we do that calibration

process unplug

it and then we can then replug it back

into our

computer and at this point our device is

now ready to

use so once we've got our device

calibrated if we have a look at its

properties then in Windows we should see

that everything is working correctly so

all of our controls and our buttons are

all doing what they should

do now one of the nice features of this

um device as well of this game pad is

that on the back here we have two um

extra buttons and these are mappable so

what we can do here is if we want to map

we can map any of the buttons on the on

the ACT controller and duplicate them

with these two buttons as well so if I

want to put uh map this L4 button to

something what I do is I hold in the M

button I then press in The L4 button and

we should then get our indicator um

flashing and then if I want to map that

to say the the right or sorry the left

d-pad I would just simply click on that

and then that is now mapped so if I look

at my properties window I should find

that my have my left d-pad there but if

I also Click The L4 button that also

then is mapped to that same button so I

can have two extra buttons which are

quite easy to get to down the bottom

here which I can map to any other

function that I want to so that is

really the um device itself so let's see

what it's like in actual game

play so for the game play I've actually

Enlisted the help of my son who who

actually plays games that were written

after 1990 unlike myself so he's a lot

better of course at these controller

games than I am and he he found the

controller to be a really good quality

one he said It felt really good in the

hand he was able to use all of the

controls really nicely like the buttons

um he wasn't massively keen on the

buttons at the back and we actually

mapped those in the end to do nothing um

he felt that sometimes he was hitting

those by accident and causing various

things to happen when he didn't want

them to happen um so again um again

personal choice here but again he put

them into doing nothing as regards the

um usage of the um game controller um he

I I don't think he was able to sort of

say whether it um made his game play

better or anything like that but he said

it was a really good experience using it

so I think that that generally gives us

a bit of a thumbs up from

him as I said for me the d-pad control

um is an important aspect and really in

the games that I was playing there where

I needed sort of the either the four-way

control or the eight-way control um it

it performed fantastically well so I was

really really pleased with that

that on these sorts of games as well um

some of them have multiple fire buttons

so the actual mapping of those back

buttons was really handy here where I

could have my my thumb on a fire button

and then use my um index finger

underneath to fire the second um bombing

button in this game Aus here so I find

those actually really useful in in some

of these

games so that pretty much wraps it up

for this video um so overall then this

game sir G7 H um I am really pleased

with it uh and thank you very much to

gam sir for sending that across to me um

and I'll be carrying on using this in in

my game play if you do want to buy one

of these I'll put some links down in the

description below uh and you can head

across there and get one for yourself I

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