Former submariner here. My thoughts echo those of a ex-submariner group I'm a part of -- it makes sense across the board. It's 1) a cost saving measure, 2) WAY easier to get replacements, and 3) WAAAYY easier to train new people to use it safely and efficiently.
This is one of those simple ideas that makes a lot of sense. I'm glad to hear there are teams working to reduce costs <i>and</i> improve UX for the military.<p>Microsoft obviously did a lot of user testing with their controller, but they must have been optimizing for a certain consumer price point as well. It makes me wonder what sort of controller you would have if they spent all that focus on usability, but with the same $38,000 price tag the periscope control panel commands.
I love it when manufacturers choose to use common and inexpensive connectors/components, rather than choosing to make their own proprietary one. Using the iec 320 c13/14, usb micro, and other "standard" connectors is laudable.
That's great. Those controllers are awesome, durable, easily replaceable, cheap, portable, intuitive, and have undergone an ungodly amount of user testing. Most importantly the recruits will typically have experience having used them in the past.
That's a good sign. I'm sure the alternative is getting a quote from some contracter who would want to reinvent the wheel for millions of dollars, and probably a worse result. Microsoft already did the legwork of development. More consumer products ( as long as there are sufficient fallbacks / quality control ), in military operations, is a-ok in my book.
I have been using an xbox one controller instead of a mouse for 4 or 5 months now. I use the qjoypad package to map the thing. It's really great and I believe it's why my chronic right-side back pain has completely vanished.<p>So as someone who uses this type of input device, I think it's a great fit for military use.
Did development engineering in the air force. Worked with xbox360 drivers as a PoC for bomb defusal bots.
The troops loved the ergonomics, and the product was cheap.
iirc i think irobot does use these for our bomb bots
South Korean Navy recently retrofitted their Type 209 and other submarines with digital camera based pericopes, replacing traditional periscopes.<p>When the South Korean Navy procurement office requested proposal from traditional periscope manufacturers, the quoted price was astronomical.<p>S Korean Navy said no thanks and had local manufacturers develop/test/manufacture a new digital camera based periscope at a FRACTION (like 10% ?) of the quoted price from traditional manufacturers.
While they're not likely to be the best control experience you can possibly get for a given application (as any serious FPS or fighting game player can tell you), the mainstream official console controllers really are engineering and design feats in their own right. This is one of those things where getting it 90% right is easy but the last 10% will make people hate using it.
Why not? It's a good controller, cheap, and readily available.<p>I'm reminded of the in-joke in <i>Metal Gear Solid 4</i> that saw Solid Snake use a PS3 controller to joystick around the "Metal Gear Mark II" recon drone. Then, as early as later that same year, actual soldiers were operating actual drones with Xbox controllers...
What about ratings?
Military hardware typically use electronics with wider margins for temperature, humidity, power surge, etc... While consumer hardware is used a lot in R&D and testing, it normally doesn't make it to the final product.<p>Of course, I practice, I think that a peripheral designed to withstand the wrath of gamers worldwide could handle an actual war just fine. And if not, replacements don't cost much. But still, it is surprising that armed forces accept something not covered by rubber stamps and red tape.
The Xbox 360 wired controller is a great piece of kit, easily the best controller ever as a balance of price, reliability, and simplicity of use - the API has literally two functions, "what buttons are pressed" and "set vibration to X". The initial Xbox One controllers were a clear regression, although the recent Xbox One X are much better again. However, for use cases such as the submarine in TFA, wireless is a liability, not an improvement.
I also am one to agree that I think this is a great step forward with maybe trimming off our huge military expenditures, particularly ones that come out as "leaks" because they are so embarrassed of them.<p>I'm sure the U.S. navy will be taking a look at the hardware and maybe even flashing their own firmware on them, lest we open ourselves up for a catastrophic backdoor.
I worked at a military contractor one summer, decades ago. Back then, nothing went out that wasn't mil-spec. My novice understanding of this was that equipment used by the military must be able to withstand a much wider variety of stress, and exhibit a much greater degree of usability under every possible scenario, than could be provided by consumer-level products. Specifically, my job at the time was sitting in a dark room helping to measure the light output of switches that were used on airplane consoles. This was understandable because this equipment is not only life-or-death but must perform in chaotic and hostile environments.<p>TL;DR. Does the xbox 360 controller to be used on navy submarine work when say....it gets wet? (or just how does it deal with saltwater corrosion). Not to mention the security issues I see other people mentioning here.
> The company says the photonic mast handgrip and imaging control panel that cost about $38,000 can be replaced with an Xbox controller that typically costs less than $30.<p>I'm curious if their supplier will give them the bargain US-government-only price of $1999.95 per controller.
I've noticed xbox style controllers are very common in the military now. I'm thinking it's a generational thing. It wasn't that long ago that you would have seen a big joystick covered in buttons serving this purpose.
It's kinda funny and pragmatic at the same time. Soon tanks and planes will be controlled this way too. It will be much easier to train all the gamers for war in reality.
> everything is controlled with a helicopter-style stick... It’s kind of clunky in your hand; it’s real heavy<p>Have we got an image of this? Side by side with the controller?
don't these things have microphones and components of questionable origins? I agree that it's basically a good idea but I'd be a little worried about embedded mics/etc from wherever living inside of nuclear subs.
XBox controllers are super inaccurate and have lot of random noise. They could have used remote controllers for drones like FrSky and plugged it in as joystick. It would cost $250 instead of $25 but, gosh, you are in $100M sub!
Not for nothing this isn't uncommon, The CLU on a javelin missile uses a ps2 controller. Split to separate hands but when your training on it your like, I remember this.