Ordered Street Fighter IV to add to my setup, what am I in for?

[BadMouth]

Finally pulled the trigger and ordered SF4 this morning.
I hope to launch it from MALA & control it with an X-Arcade tankstick.

Fore-warned is Fore-armed and all that, so I have a few questions....

Is it required that the DVD be in the drive to play the game?
If so, does anyone have it working from an image on a virtual drive?

One reviewer claimed that it needed to connect to windows live to work, is this true?!
(I have no DVD drive or internet connection on this PC)

From other posts & reviews, it sounds like mapping the controls is a pain.
The x-arcade just simulates keyboard strokes.
What about mapping the controls inside SF4 is difficult?

Any other info about what I'm in for would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
- Dan

[J.Max]

It's not bad...I use it with my Slikstik (which uses an Ipac), and I haven't had problems.  It's kind of annoying that you can't remap the "confirm" and "exit" keys though, because you always need to have a regular keyboard handy, and you can't use a mouse for anything. 

You do need to have the DVD in the drive, but there are ways around that, of course.

As far as Windows Live goes, you don't need to have it hooked up to that for it to work.  That's only for match play, which is kind of annoying anyway.

[Malenko]

I thought you could download the game from capcom or steam or something and bypass th need for physical media, of course you can install it then get a no CD crack

[shateredsoul]

the issue i had was that when it launched from cd, this screen would popup that asked me to confirm something...forgot exactly what it said, but it ruined it for me because you had to click on it with your mouse.  Can you share the settings/hacks you end up using to get around this issue? That would be great if you could.

[RayB]

PM'd

[javeryh]

the issue i had was that when it launched from cd, this screen would popup that asked me to confirm something...forgot exactly what it said, but it ruined it for me because you had to click on it with your mouse.  Can you share the settings/hacks you end up using to get around this issue? That would be great if you could.

You could set up autohotkey to get around this.  Delusional got SFIV running really great on his cab.  .  Also, check out the thread he started about the Player 2 controls patch.

[DashRendar]

Wow, that looks great Javeryh!

[DCsegaDH]

I set up Auto Hot Key on mine too, I took the idea from Delusional

[BadMouth]

Thanks for the replies!

Having solutions ready before I get to the problems is a life saver.