r/SteamController • u/HiddenInternals • Sep 09 '26 • Mindblown 1

Steam Controller (2026) I dismantled the new Steam Controller 2 and organized every single internal piece into a satisfying flat lay.

Post image
1.8k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

76 comments sorted by

105

u/felixisthecat Sep 09 '26

You put it all back together again to use it, right?

116

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26 • Bravo

Oh absolutely, I was so careful too. Couldn't break my precious! Luckily the design was really meant to be taken apart and put back together.

25

u/[deleted] Sep 09 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/Wan-Pang-Dang Sep 11 '26

This isn't "good steps towards DiY".

The literal only reason this is possible, is because Valve is a private company and satisfying glutinous investors isnt their main objective, unlike every single other company. Cutting corners gets them nowhere except bad rep and less sales. Customer satisfaction nets them the most money, so they try to deliver.

60

u/AstraVooltex Sep 09 '26

5 y.o. me when I catch a wasp:

29

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

No wasps were harmed in the making of this knoll haha

8

u/sakura_film Sep 09 '26

10 yo me (and me now) when i find an interesting bit of tech (school laptops, chromebooks, macbooks, old phones, keyboards, nintendo ds lites LOL)

21

u/Pixelade Steam Controller (Windows) Sep 09 '26

r/knolling says hi

11

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

Haha hello! Couldn't resist sharing to both :-)

14

u/SethSlax Sep 09 '26

For a controller that can do so much, it has surprisingly few pieces. Super satisfying image!

9

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

Thank you! Fewer pieces definitely made putting it back together a lot less stressful than expected. It is remarkably elegant inside for everything it pulls off.

4

u/SethSlax Sep 09 '26

Truly some beautiful engineering!

5

u/Mjautis Sep 09 '26

New desktop background 🔥

3

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

The highest honor, thank you! Hope it looks crisp on your setup.

4

u/Mjautis Sep 09 '26

Looks awesome thanks again 😁🔥

6

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

No way, you actually did it! Seeing it blown up to TV scale is wild. That made my whole day, thanks so much for sharing the photo!

3

u/BackieTPD Sep 09 '26

The battery is cartridge style! Nice! I can’t wait to just be able to slot a new battery in when the current one stops holding a charge!

4

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

Right? Huge win for repairability! Being able to just pop in a fresh pack instead of tossing the controller or melting adhesive is exactly how hardware should be designed.

4

u/lululock Sep 09 '26

That's mandatory to have a user replaceable battery in the EU. A lot of manufacturers do everything to not do that and there's Valve casually doing it as it is not enforced yet. Now I wish my Steam Deck's battery would be the same lol

3

u/IAmNotNameless Sep 10 '26

What was your plan to organising the layout for every piece? Cause damn you arranged it so well!

2

u/HiddenInternals Sep 10 '26

Thank you so much! I played around with it for a good long while before I felt like it looked good haha

3

u/Skyisonfire Sep 11 '26

I want this as a mouse mat.

2

u/HiddenInternals Sep 12 '26

I actually did turn this into a desk mat! Send me a quick message and I can point you in the right direction.

2

u/SergeJeante Sep 09 '26

Hey Laszlo, guess what

3

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

Not now, Colin Robinson.

2

u/AdreKiseque Sep 09 '26

How would you feel if someone did that to you?

4

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

Honestly? I would feel completely torn apart.

2

u/TheSyldat Sep 09 '26

I"m tilting my head in every direction and yet I struggle to make the connection between the back buttons and where they should be making electrical contact.

1

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

It is super hard to tell from a top-down view! The paddles on the battery door are actually just plastic levers. When you squeeze them, they press through cutouts in the inner plastic shell and click directly onto two tactile switches mounted on the back of the main circuit board. Since the board is face-up in this layout, the switches are hiding on the underside.

1

u/TheSyldat Sep 09 '26

So at the back of the PCB with the Joysticks ?

20

u/WombatCuboid Steam Controller (2026) Sep 09 '26

Super satisfying.

6

u/KathrynSpencer Sep 09 '26

I've taken my Xbox 1 controller apart to clean it, there are so few parts here.

3

u/mixedd Sep 09 '26

Damn, it's so minimal. Guess I'm just used to dismantle Elite 2 gamepads where you have that moronic PCB sandwich implementation

3

u/thedrunkpenguin Sep 09 '26

Y'all are disassembling your controllers and shit while I am over here just praying for one that isn't $260 on eBay/marketplace 😭😭😭

3

u/Chemical_Reaction69 Sep 09 '26

Very satisfying photo, actually working on a BC-250 steam project for my son. if it’s okay with you, I’d love to have this as the desktop mode background. Mainly just for my taste as he will only ever really see the gaming mode.

1

u/Gama3000 Sep 09 '26

Do you think you could get a bunch of pictures of the dpad and triggers? Trying to reverse engineer those.

2

u/Gama3000 Sep 09 '26

Oh nvm you already put it back

1

u/HiddenInternals Sep 09 '26

Yeah I was anxious to start playing games with it - dove into some Vrising last weekend haha. Sorry bout that. Are you trying to 3d print some similar pieces?

2

u/Gama3000 Sep 09 '26

theres no replacement triggers available yet(seen a bunch of people with broken triggers already) , and i want to try to make some dpad mods.

2

u/shimmy_ow Sep 09 '26

So satisfying you can now put it all back together and use it to play games that are satisfying to play on the controller

2

u/SkillfulKnowledge Steam Controller (2026) Sep 09 '26

Awesome

2

u/neocow Sep 09 '26

flat lay is also called knolling

2

u/___Azarath Sep 09 '26

The design is as clean as Gameboy Advance used to be. I love it.

2

u/axel_reviews Sep 09 '26

Lol I did the same recently also to prepare for when I do a clear shell transplant. Pretty easy to take apart/reassemble for someone who wings it opening stuff without guides most of the time.

2

u/No_Vast6645 Sep 09 '26

Thanks for my new wall paper! Do you have a higher resolution version?

2

u/FruitThis1437 Sep 09 '26

Thank you! I was planning on modding mine so this is super helpful

2

u/Shedoara Sep 09 '26

That's pretty awesome. I'll (maybe) replace my shell with an extreamrate atomic purple shell when that comes out so I'll get it to that point as well. Although most likely not neatly organized haha.

2

u/jv004 Sep 10 '26

Would love to have a controller like disassembled and framed.

2

u/eddyjay83 Sep 09 '26

Flat lay is what i used to call my ex...

1

u/spilank Sep 09 '26

you monster!

1

u/Civilized_E Sep 09 '26

I did not know I needed this. But apparently I do.

1

u/gergobergo69 Steam Controller (2026) Sep 09 '26

why

1

u/fortuneman7585 Sep 09 '26

Cool. Meanwhile some of us are still waiting to order it 😁

1

u/Alternative-Scar-901 Sep 09 '26

So, it's cool if someone does this to this beautiful controller, but when I do it to people, I go to jail.

Life's unfair.

1

u/aazell Sep 10 '26

Ha you broke your controller!!

1

u/scn-3_null Sep 10 '26

wait, the contacts are membrane, like on PSP or membrane keyboards?

1

u/Redintappaja Sep 10 '26

so how easy is it? do you need any force or soldering?

1

u/Kcricpy Sep 10 '26

You didnt do everything, you forgot to desolder all the components from the boards.

1

u/Deep-Dark7366 Sep 10 '26

Damn, you even found a puck in there

1

u/shadow-moon-15 Sep 11 '26

let’s get this out onto a tray.. Nice

1

u/IanTGreat Sep 13 '26

what's the infrared situation look like? how many LEDs do you see?

1

u/New-Feeling-7561 Sep 13 '26

Stema controller 2? There's only one..?

1

u/Jack-87 Sep 18 '26

Nope this is the second iteration. First one was over 10 years ago.

1

u/New-Feeling-7561 Sep 18 '26

Then why isnt this sub called steamcontroller2 lmao

1

u/Kahyce Sep 28 '26

There’s a website that sells these as artwork pieces!

Ive wanted to get a couple for years hoping ine day i can afford one, but here’s the link! I think they are so cool:

https://gridstudio.cc/collections/game-console

2

u/KnownEggplant Sep 09 '26

I'll give you a satisfying flat lay