Hardware & Technical Avoid the X-56 like the plague.

I believe their excuse for no thumb switch is that it can be used by either hand. That in my family is not a valid excuse, my youngest mentioned above is left handed.

Which his friends say is cheating, because while his secondary hand is as good as theirs using joystick or mouse, his primary hand is better at using throttle buttons and keyboards.

He got skillz!

Yeah, the thumb rest plastic thingamabob can be switched around to the other side hence no buttons there. The other buttons along the top are perfectly symmetrical (and equally bad regardless of what hand you use). It's a cheap stick, but an accurate one that lasts a while (not sure how long the buttons will last). Really wish they'd redone the design even just a little. The far less accurate Logitech E3D Pro is much better in that regard. There are more buttons and they are better placed and the stick itself feels good on the hand (well in mine anyway as that's very subjective). Frankly, I'm still a bigger fan of the CH Products as they are superbly functional. I don't have pedals so I use the ministick for yaw and have the straff thrusters on a four way hat in the throttle. In ED I really don't find much need to have strafing thrusters on analogue (even with fa off). I suppose if you want to do seriously delicate maneuvers, but if you really feel the need for that you're better off with a twin stick setup anyway.
 
I honestly cannot say I have had any bad kit from Saitek.

After several years use I retired my trusty X52 Pro for an X55 in December 2014 (nothing wrong with the X52 - it's still my backup if I need it).

My X55 developed a glitch in the bottom 4-way on the throttle back in May but that's the only problem I had with it in 18 months of use. I contacted Madcatz support and was promised a replacement of an X56 which I received earlier this month - all working great so far, plus they gave me an extra 2 months warranty extension gratis...cannot say fairer that that. [yesnod]
 
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