It’s unacceptable that in year 2025 companies are refusing to make controllers with hall effect sensors. At this point I can’t think of it as anything other than planned obsolesence in order to sell replacement Joy-cons.
From my understanding, hall effect sticks won’t work in switch 2 joycons, due to magnetic interference from the attachment mechanism. Instead, they would need something else - I hear TMR would be resistant to the magnetic interference.
Is that actually true, or just internet speculation? I remember reading counter points that other devices with magnets used Hall effect sticks without issues.
The thing is, even the new Pro controller uses potentiometers for the sticks, so I doubt magnetic interference to Hall effect sticks was even a consideration in the Nintendo engineers minds. They were going full potentiometer from day 1.
It’s true- it’s well known that hall effect sensors are magnetically sensitive and do poorly in handhelds (like the steam deck, ROG ally, or joycons on a docked switch) for that exact reason- they can basically only be used in standalone controllers. More to the point, since the HD rumble is magnetically actuated, there’s even more interference than just the main system itself + the connector system. You CAN try to account for that interference, but why would you do that when…
Hall effect sensors actually have some major downsides- they have poorer centering, increased power draw, the aforementioned magnetic interference issues, the fact they don’t actually solve stick drift, and finally and most concerningly- they have a REALLY low poll rate. I was able to notice the difference when playing celeste with a buddy’s hall effect controllers, for example.
More to the point, gulikit is definitely engaging in some corporate double-speak here- the switch 2 joy cons use the same analog stick design… that basically every game company has used for decades. NOT the same sticks as the switch 1 joycons. They’re completely different, Nintendo went back to the ‘standard’ design instead of the ‘short’ design that caused the problem in the switch 1.
Shame that it will very likely be needed, but good that a company is willing to step up. The GuliKit Hall effect sticks for Switch served me well since I put them in.
One of mine developed drift again after a couple years. Not calibration related. I ended up buying the Hori joy-con replacements and they’ve worked great so far.
