Doesn't the next generation of controller simply work over bluetooth? I know the DS3 already does. If that's the case, it shouldn't require any specialized hardware, since almost everything comes with bluetooth these days.

Sony and Nintendo use Bluetooth, while Microsoft uses a proprietary wireless protocol.

Nintendo uses a proprietary connection for the Wii U GamePad as well.

That doesn't surprise me, the GamePad in particular seems like something that bluetooth wasn't really designed for. Does it even have the bandwidth to push video? It's pretty power-hungry when 100% active too.

I think they're actually using a variant of 802.11n on the 5 GHz band for the Wii U GamePad, probably because it's the cheapest option that has enough bandwidth.

This was my first thought when i heard about steam OS - currently I've forced the official Microsoft driver onto my Chinese knock-off wireless receiver, will that work on steamOS? i don't know...

The Linux kernel should support the receiver and xbox 360 gamepad out of the box. If its not currently I suppose this has a very high priority for fixing at Valve.

I did the same, the thing took a while renaming inf files and such to get working on Windows.

Linux, plug and play. Lovely.

Can you share where you got your no-name wireless receiver?

I got mine on Amazon. Believe it or not, it worked first try and it turned out to be a Microsoft one. Drivers were not an issue once I figured out that some of my USB ports were powered and others were not - it needs a lot of power to work.

http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-Wireless-Gaming-Receiver-Wind...

It was Amazon - this one specifically:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0096PLB9O/ref=oh_details_o...

To get it working, you need to install the Microsoft Wireless XBox 360 Controller drivers manually, then go to the hardware manager and manually specify the official Microsoft driver as the driver for this device. Easy enough if you know your way around driver updates, but not plug-and-play. It works great, though.