Sidewinder Force Feedback 2 in XP?

[Rat]

Please tell me that a device that I bought not much more than six months ago, as new, is not supported, and will not be, under Win XP?

I have the Sidewinder Force Feedback 2 joystick. When I bought it, I had Windows 2000, and it worked fine. Now I have Windows XP, and it will not install. Microsoft are, of course, pulling out of much of the hardware market, but producing drivers for the operating system they were promoting at the same time as they were selling the device is surely not too much to ask?

I'm told that writing drivers (or adapting existing ones) is a fairly trivial task, but I wouldn't know where to begin.

Anyone have any experience in this, or ideas on where I can find such things?

Cheers,
Rat.

[Darat]

Sorry for insulting your intelligence but are you sure it isn't working?

DirectX (or rather DirectInput) should look after it.

[Rat]

Yes, I tried it in Flight Sim, and nothing works. Will not move ailerons or anything; certainly no force feedback. When I plug it in (whether or not I install the Sidewinder software first), it asks me for drivers. There are none. It then tells me that it won't work, and it doesn't.

Looking at various message boards, I see many people with the same problem, but then others saying they're just morons who can't follow instructions, and that XP supports the joystick natively. This is certainly not the case (the latter part) in my case.

This is XP Pro, SP1, btw.

Cheers,
Rat.

[Darat]

I don't have it connected at the moment, but I used to use one with XP Pro and FS Century with no problem.

Have you ran DXdiag and checked your DirectX is all installed and working hunky dory?

[Rat]

I have not run dxdiag, though I definitely have DX9.0b. I'll try it when I get home.

It's good, anyway, that someone has had it working.

Cheers,
Rat.

[Darat]

There is something nagging my memory about when I first installed the Joystick and tried to get it to work with FS.

If I remember what it is I'll drop it into a post.

[FFed]

Try doing a windows update and see if there are new drivers for it.

[Shaun from Scotland]

Originally posted by ratcomp1974
I have not run dxdiag, though I definitely have DX9.0b. I'll try it when I get home.

It's good, anyway, that someone has had it working.

Cheers,
Rat.

Mine is about six months old too and has the USB connector. Works absolutely fine in XP.