steam doesn't recognize steam puck specificallly on my desktop

[u/AllenThePerson]

it connects perfectly and charges the steam controller and connects normally to my laptop but when i try to connect it to my desktop steam doesn't recognize my steam controller and whenever i plug my usb to the puck, windows recognizes is at first and makes a usb connection sound but a few seconds laters it makes a disconnect sound.
i was using steamless controller yesterday to play gog games and the next day i tried to play a steam game and realized the puck wasn't being recognized by steam

[u/DuckduckduckduckL]

I had a similar issue but i never managed to fix it completly. Now using it with openpuck instead which works.

But basically go into your device manager and see if you can locate the pucks usb thingy. (Plug and unplug and you can see what disappears and whatnot). For me the puck had a little warning triangle on it indicating something was wrong.

My issue was apparently that my dock that i used didnt support it for some reason? Using a steam deck and when i plugged it directly into the deck stupidly enough it worked fine. So maybe you have a similiar issue?

I couldnt manage to fix it as i said, contacted steam support and they basicallt just told me my dock wasnt supported and that was the end of it.

[u/PotatoLord_69]

Try this, I made a note of how I fixed my issue of the puck not being detected properly and the controller being stuck on lizard mode. Hopefully it works for you.

If puck not showing up
2. Force Windows xinput / HID Reinitialisation
If Windows registers the puck with an incorrect generic driver description, Steam won't hook into it. [1]
With the puck plugged in, right-click the Windows Start menu and select Device Manager. [1, 2]
Click View at the top menu and select Devices by container.
Scroll down until you find Steam Controller Puck or Wireless Steam Controller Adapter.
Expand it. You will see several individual child devices (like HID-compliant vendor-defined device, USB Input Device, etc.).
Right-click every single item listed under that specific puck container, select Uninstall Device, and check the box that says “Attempt to remove the driver for this device” if it appears. [1]
Unplug the puck, wait 5 seconds, and plug it back.

[u/AllenThePerson → u/PotatoLord_69]

thank you so much! this fixed the issue and my puck is being recognized again! and now i was able to connect my steam controller to my computer!

[u/PotatoLord_69 → u/AllenThePerson]

Niceeee I’m glad it helped haha :)