Microsoft Sidewinder Joystick Questions

[markronz]

I recently picked up a Microsoft Sidewinder Joystick from Good Will for $3.   I bought it just in case I could find some use for it in MAME.   So far, in both my arcades I've built, I just had standard controls: normal joysticks, buttons, and a trackball.   So I'm a bit wet behind the ears when it comes to stuff like flight stick like joysticks.  So I have a few questions.

1.   I tried searching for Sidewinder on the forum, and found a bunch of posts of people hacking them.   Why would you need to hack them if they have a USB connector?   Wouldn't I just be able to hook it up to the PC and just use it in MAME as is?

2.  What games would I be able to play with this?   I know there's somewhere I can search the MAME game lists for this sort of thing, but I can't seem to find it any more...  Can someone help me locate this, or the list of what games this would be useful for?

3.  What do people think of these Sidewinder joysticks?  Do they work well?  Sure seemed like there were a decent amount of posts about people hacking them, so you'd have to assume they work well, but I wanted to hear what people had to say about them.

4.   And lastly, does anyone have any pictures of how they mounted one of these to their control panels?   I'm debating, based on the amount of games I'd like to play that use it, on whether or not it would be worth permanently mounting it to my control panel.  So I was hoping some one out there could have some pictures to share of how theres are mounted, in case I go that route.

Thanks!

[Donkbaca]

I think the hacking posts you are talking about are about the sidewinder gamepad, and they are used because, if I remember right, they are common ground, easy to solder to and plug into a gameport

[markronz]

Oh ok, gotcha. Thanks for clarifying that.   

Still looking for some answers to the questions though, if anyone has anything to offer!

[TacoTownCharlie]

The joysticks and pads are fine controls.  On a two player cab, you can easily add a third player.  I think most of the talk around hacking them was to use them either to wire up your arcade buttons and joysticks to your computer or, in the case of the Sidewinder, hook up arcade trackballs and steering wheels to your computer. 

They work fine as is, and they provide an easy way to hook up arcade parts to your computer.

[markronz]

Well, the sidewinder that I linked was actually the flight stick looking one, not a gamepad.

Still looking for some answers.  I guess most importantly, where I can find out how to search for the games that use a flight stick sort of joystick.

Thanks!

[TopJimmyCooks]

Basically any analog stick game - I use a flight style analog for star wars, tailgunner.  you can use the info from controls.dat to search on games with analog joystick controls. 

[drventure]

I used an analog Logitec flightstick on my panel. I got lucky in that once I took the stick out of it's normal base, it turns out it mates almost perfectly to a standard happ super stick frame (with a little bit of cutting).

Which means that I could mount the converted flightstick exactly like any other arcade joystick.

Might be worth checking to see if the sidewinder would work similarly.