Hey Guys and Ladies,  I just wish to draw your attention to a costly joystick problem. In the hardware forum , a problem was asked w/o any real  answer and I was hoping for more input .  This problem cost me 2 joysticks and has likely " HURT " others also . ???   [ Hardware- - -  Stinking Sidewinder.  No up elevator ]    Always appreciate your help.     caveman

I doubt it's a hardware failure.  I've had a Sidewinder for years and it's been subjected to every kind of abuse possible and it's never given me a bit of a problem.

I'm not sure which OS you're using so this is kind of general.

Open the Windows calibration utility and recalibrate it.  If it works it's not a hardware problem.

If it works at all but you have some problems calibrating it unplug the stick and uninstall the driver.  You will have to uninstall and reinstall manually in W98 but XP will do it automatically - you will see the "Found new hardware" dialog the next time you boot and I recommend a cold boot (power off, reinsert stick, power on).

If Windows won't calibrate it after this it may be a hardware problem.

If Windows will calibrate it but FS still has problems exit FS, go into your FS2002 folder and rename FS2002.cfg to FS2002.bak.  Start FS and it will create a new FS2002.cfg with default settings.  You should be able to use FS to reconfigure your stick's settings.  Unfortunately, you will have to reconfigure all of your settings or copy and paste large chunks of data from FS2002.bak to your new FS2002.cfg.

Another thought.  Under "hardware problems", make sure your USB ports are working correctly by plugging another USB device in.  If you have a friend running XP you can test your stick on his/her system.  I thought my stick died about a year ago and took it to a friend's house where it calibrated perfectly.  It turned out a faulty USB hard drive had clobbered all of my USB settings.

BTW, what's your OS?