Phizzle,
Thanks, that's a nice and yet oddly disturbing compliment.
Bursk,
The pear-shaped sticks are great for a "full fist grip" type of play. It's actually very comfortable.
When I've played with ball-top joysticks in the past, it's been more of a "first two fingers and thumb" type of grip, but the ball is so big on these joysticks that they, too, require a full fist grip, but that's not necessarily a bad thing, just different from the way I've used ball-top joysticks in the past.
The springs do require installation (see the review video for how to install the springs on the P360 joystick base -- the competition base is roughly the same -- unscrew the bottom of the joystick base, pull out the spring, put in the new spring. Pretty simple really.
As to the CP layout, the SlikStik trackball (ball, not plate) is about 6" away from the 4-way joystick, about 2.5" away from the edge of the player 1 buttons, and about 3.5" away from the trackball buttons.
The only interference I've ever seen with the trackball is the occasional bump of the 4-way by people doing the "Golden Tee thumb flick" trackball move, and as soon as they realize they can't throw their hands that far forward, it's not a problem.
Kevin