Wireed controller not working

[shjacobsen]

So I am not as tech-savvy as I should be so please be patient. I bought a preloaded recalbox console a year or so ago. It came with 2 "2.4ghz wireless gamepad" controllers and I later purchased 2 additional controllers that are identical except the color of the buttons (see picture). I found the wireless connection to be unreliable so I found myself connecting the controllers with the USB cable. Under these circumstances, they worked great...but the cables were short which was annoying. So I ordered some longer cables. Unfortunately, now when I tried to hook up the controllers today they did not work. I thought maybe I had purchased bad cables, but they don't work even with the old short cables and my PS4 controller works great when connected to the long cables...so I don't think the new cables are the culprit. In the past, I have just connected the controller to the cable and it worked. Not sure why it is being troublesome now.

Things I have tried to this point:
1 - holding the start button (as if trying to sync with the wireless receiver), also tried holding any number of other buttons combinations. the LED light on the controller blinks as I press buttons and sometimes it will do some variety of blinking patterns while I am not pressing buttons. I don't know what any of the blinks mean. The controllers did not come with a real user manual, just directions for wireless connection. and I can't find any info online about what a particular sequence of blinks could mean.
2 - Plugging the controller in before start-up, and plugging in after start-up

You may say to yourself "Hey you said the PS4 controller worked, just use that one"...and I can absolutely do that. But as a matter of convenience and having dedicated controllers for this unit, and as a matter of principle (i want stuff I buy to work properly) I would really like to solve this issue. I would bet this ends up being a simple solution and I will look dumb...but I am stumped at the moment, so any help would be great.

THANK YOU!

[Zing]

@shjacobsen said in Wireed controller not working:

I bought a preloaded recalbox console a year or so ago.

I'm sorry, but the purchase / sale of the Recalbox System and the distribution of ROMS is illegal. The Forum does not support illegally distributed images, in which case you should ask the seller for support.