As great as the Playstation 4 (PS4) is, the Dualshock 4 controller's battery life is shocking! At least, this seems to be a problem a lot Playstation 4 owners have been reporting with their Dualshock 4 controllers, which is probably caused by one of two things. 1) Age of the controller and 2) Having the controller plugged in the charging dock all the time!
A healthy Dualshock 4 controller battery should last 4-5 hours from a single charge. Of course, disabling vibration feedback and reducing the speaker volume will help extend the life of the battery.
For nonstop playing though, you will have no other option but to buy an extra PS4 controller or get a rechargeable battery pack that hooks on to the controller. Some Playstation 4 owners are even resulting to clever hacks like using a long USB cord attached to a wall charger or powerbank.
While the mentioned options are viable, there aren't as convenient, safer or cheaper than getting a third-party wired gamepad like the NACON compact wired controller, which is an official licensed controller for the Playstation 4 console.
The cable is non-detachable and it's fixed to the rear of the controller in between the rear bumper buttons. The cable measures 3 meters long (almost 10 feet) and a has a semi-rigid rubber sleeve with a thick strain relief a the controller end.
The opposite end of the NACON controller cable terminates in a USB connector with a 4cm long (and 5mm thick) hard plastic plug, which features a small NACON etching and a tiny bump which provide a grippy surface.
The rear front of the NACON wired controller has a high gloss black finish, while the rest of the controller has rubber coating throughout. The back of the handles have molded curvatures to fit the contour of the fingers. The handles integrate a rumble motor each and, they are slightly shorter in length than the handles of a PS4 Dualshock controller.
The base of the NACON wired controller has no markings other than a spec tag and seven holes housing the screws holding the two halves of the controller together. On the front of the controller, there is six buttons, including a Playstation button located in between the 3.5mm headset jack and the touchpad.
The Playstation button only powers the controller. It will not power the Playstation 4 console like the Playstation button on a Dualshock 4 controller does, which can turn the console on and off when holding this button for 10 seconds.
Just like the DualShock touchpad, the NACON touchpad works just like the touchpad of a laptop but, it's also a click button that you can click (anywhere on the touchpad) as well as swipe. The touchpad measures 5cm long and 2.6cm wide and has an interesting finish with the triangle, circle, X and square symbols arranged like hieroglyphs.
There are four play buttons (5mm diameter) located on the far right, which feature the characteristic triangle, circle, X and square symbols. There is no speaker built-in, no light bar and the NACON controller does not support Sixaxis motion sensing, which lets you turn a PS4 controller into a steering wheel or yoke for flying a plane or driving a car.
The NACON wired compact controller has a similar layout to that of a PS4 Dualshock controller, although the touch pad is closer to the Share/Options buttons. The 4-way directional pad is on the left with two analog joysticks in the bottom centre with 4cm spacing. Both joysticks have rubberized tips with different textured patterns: honeycomb (left joystick) and NACON logo (right joystick).
Even if you don't have a PS4, you can use the NACON wired controller with a PC, although the controller will be recognized as an Xbox controller; hence the touchpad on the NACON controller won't work. In terms of performance, the NACON wired controller will work good for light gamers but not to the same high level for a hardcore gamer. If you prefer the style of the Xbox controller, check out the Revolution X Pro controller.
The NACON wired controller has obviously been designed not to outperform an original PS4 controller. For instance, the analog sticks cannot be replaced on the NACON controller. The NACON d-pad also has the classic cross-shape (2.3cm square size) whereas the d-pad on a Dualshock 4 controller has four sectioned-off buttons, which not only prevents accidental presses but it also registers presses more accurately.
The 3.5mm headphone amp in the NACON isn't as loud as the audio amp in the Dualshock controller. Having said all of this, the Nacon controller does seem to have faster response times, which is likley due to the Nacon controller being wired.
With this controller, you also won't need to buy a charging station for both controllers and ever worry about battery life like you do with wireless. The Nacon PS4 controller weighs 330 grams and, it measures 15cm long, 10cm wide and 6cm tall so, it's more suited for smaller hands. You can buy the NACON compact wired controller on amazon.