Joystick Control Set-up for Beginners
I've spent over 10 hours playing the game and getting frustrated with my joystick controls, or lack thereof. I had a significant dead zone in all three axes (pitch, roll, yaw) and have spent at least another 10 hours trying to figure out if I had a bad joystick or corrupt driver, or some other problem. Turns out the problem was me. So I present this guide for all the other newbies out there. Much of this information was gleaned from these forums -- but it's scattered all over and not succinctly. Or if it is, then please tell me where it is.
When you go into options and controls, you'll notice a preset drop-down list at the top. I don't think it matters which one you choose because as soon as you start making changes, it switches to Custom. I assumed the left column was for keyboard and the right for joystick and that's generally true, but not entirely. If you hover your mouse over, e.g., the left column at Yaw Axis you'll notice that the pop-up box tells you this is analog input. If you hover your mouse over the left and right columns at Yaw Left you'll notice that the pop-up box tells you this is digital input. This is important! Keyboard and most joystick buttons should be set up as digital input; however, the joystick pitch, roll, yaw axes should be set up as analog. If you set them up as digital as I did, you basically have pitch on or off and control is a real bear! Same goes for throttle if you control that with your joystick -- set up as analog and should be on Continuous rather than one of the increments that you can choose (like 12.5 or 25%).
Once you finish your control scheme and click apply, then it'll be saved as:
C:\Users\<Windows Profile Name>\AppData\Local\Frontier Developments\Elite Dangerous\Options\Bindings\Custom.binds
It wasn't intuitive to me where this was. You don't need to go there or tamper with it unless you want to create a custom preset. To find this location, you'll need to go into Control Panel/folder options and make hidden files and folders visible. So once you have your Custom.binds you can go in and make a copy and re-name the copy to whatever you want. I named mine after my joystick model. Leave the re-named file in that same folder and it'll now show up as a preset drop-down at the top of controls. You can even make changes to it using options/controls and it'll be saved as that same name when you click Apply.
So thanks to all of you out there that provided an education for me -- and I hope this helps some new pilots.