This was an excellent review. Loved the demo you did for us that shows us why you like this one so much. My problem with the Siatek systems has usually been with the programming so I'm looking forward to the software review on this. Thanks man.

Just picked one of these up based on your review, loving it so far thanks a lot Pete. Some more black shark videos would be amazing! Just getting into it after playing a lot of DCS Huey.

nice video and congrats again about your sponsors and all the other good things you earned. and good luck for your continued growth.

frooglesim, I'm new to flight sims, I took a interest since Elite Dangerous Alpha and have been hunting for a joystick/throttle combo since. I have to thank you for your review as it has made me purchase the X-55 over all other sticks out there, I was going to get the warthog but this review changed my mind completely. I'm waiting for it in the mail as I write this. This will be my first ever joystick and I cant wait to start using it. I also went ahead and got X-Plane 10 along with some arcade flight sims that I will play once I get this beast. Thanks again for your review and I have subscribed to your channel. Thanks mate!

I am SO getting this when it comes out, Thanks for doing the review!

Thank you. A very passionate review you have made!

Just ordered it earlier this evening. Reviews like this make me exited to get it :)

Im sooooo glad i ordered this cant wait to get it next week!

Another quality video and very balanced and in depth review Pete, keep up the good work and hope to see you on our stand at Cosford later in the year. Daryl DHL Virtual Cargo

Froogle, Excellent review (as always). Interestingly enough, I just made my first flight in the DCS Huey shortly before watching this video. Knew you were into FSX, not DCS though. Will being go to the Saitek site after posting this!

I ordered X55 yesterday. I am so excited to play Xplane10, as I havent yet also I have ordered that yesterday as well. Ive upgraded my graphics card to the GTX 770, bought a 24 inch monitor and upgraded my computer to an i5 with a 650 watt power supply all in this week alone> preparing for this! Can you do more videos of Xplane on a regular basis. I learn alot from watching them. Thanks.

Wow great review - good to see it actually in action too!

Great to see that your flying the Huey!! My favorite Helicopter. I've flown a Bell 206 Jetranger in real life through work. And i can say that the controls are so precise and sensitive. I have found in flight sims with my basic setup i got, that it is completely different to real life. Judging by your review and footage of this stick, you can get really precise controls just like in real life. Great review and looking to buy this stick in the future :)

Excellent review! I am buying on this coming Friday. I would LOVE to have your Black Shark profile my good man!

Froogle I just made a trial account for Pilot Edge, and I tell you it was so much fun. I can;t wait to do it again. Thank you for telling us about it. Is so great!

Thanks for the review Froogle. Just purchased an x-55 based on your review and am looking forward to playing some serious dcs with it. Cheers mate.

Thanks Froogle for this review and for showing off Black shark and other games with it :) im buying a full setup next month and iv been so torn between the warthog and X55 but nobody reviewed the X55 yet :D... So again thanks :)

Great review. Thanks Froogle. Won't be ditching my Warthog but its a fantastic piece of kit especially for those who simply don't have the massive funds needed for a hog. I reckon it'll also push other manufacturers to up their game which can only be good.

Great review - great enthusiasm. Thank you!

Thanks for the very straight forward review. I think I will go with this.

Hey froogle on my X55 I also found the rudder to feel "notchy" I took the base apart and put an extremely small amount of dielectric grease be tween the contact surfaces, just used a Q-tip to spread it about, carefully! pieced everything back together, and although rudder pedals are the way to go, it's silky smooth now, and I have it mapped to my differential brakes :).

Very good review. Has me sold on buying a full set up of x-55.

Totally agree with you on the dip switches, they are so much easier to work with whilst making a profile for your sims. The analogue dials are great for games that can take advantage of them, but for everything else, trying to make use of them by way of binding keys to analogue dials can be a real pain!

Sold. I knew I was interested in this stick from the moment they teased it, but after watching this review, I'm preordering one RTFM. Thanks for making this video!

I love your honesty when it comes to brand deals and your videos are amazing, i wish i could come to the meet in Florida but I live in Canada and im in college so no time, but keep up the good work i love what you do !

Thanks for the review, I have bought one on your recommendation and I hope it arrives here is Australia in time for Star Citizens Dog Fighting Module release!

I applaud your detail of this stick and actually taking it through 2 different types of rotary aircraft with wildly different flight characteristics. Thank you for making the decision a bit easier to decide which HOTAS to go with. ~S~ Good hunting mate!

On my x-52 Pro, I use the big wheel on the throttle for flaps, the small wheel for speedbrakes, and the slider for thrust vectoring if I'm flying anything vtol. I always knew that those wheels had a little "bump" in the middle position, but never thought much about it until this video. They would be PERFECT for the pitch and rudder trim. Right now I have the trim set up to one of the hats on the joystick, but the flaps and speedbrakes can go there since most aircraft call for those in increments/chunks anyway, but you want smooth fine control on the trim.

so you had it for more than a year, how is it holding up? have you noticed any wobble or play in the stick? do the mechanics how any signs of wear, cracks?

frooglesim Hey frugal, great review. It was the clincher for me in acquiring my own X-55! Regarding the trim set-up, I've found it easier to run the elevator trim on the top throttle rotary with the underside one serving the rudder. Prop RPM and mixture are dealt with by way of the rotaries you used for trim. Hence, I can trim up without hands of the throttle. I know it's subjective but it just suits my style of hands-on. I can't believe how easy this system has made it to fly in X-Plane. My only gripe, no software support for us Mac OS X users. This is a cross I'm more than happy to bear though. Keep up the good work buddy.

There is also a dial on the thrust control by the pinky, and a "trim" wheel on left side of thrust control. So many buttons. X-55 + TrackIR = Fantastic times while flying!

I have this HOTAS too and I absolutely love it. Best HOTAS I've ever had.

Very good review! Ordered an X55 myself. Also subbed! =)

great review. just ordered the last one in stock at amazon :-)

Great video, great review, I've also learned something about Xplane as well. Good job. I fly Helicopters with the X55 using Xplane, but I've modified my X55 to have a realistic cyclic control.

O order it too! Cant wait!

Great review of a very good product. I just bought the X-55 today and in setup process. Was wondering can you share your X-55 Profiles for DCS. With Thanks.

It looks like I'm a little late to the party, but you just sold me one of these sticks, it looks like what I want, it has the sensitivity and accuracy I want, and it has more buttons than I could ever want. The price is a bit steep on a part timers salary, but I will save the extra $70 USD or so to buy this instead of the x52 which I have heard some questionable things about. I do agree with some others in these comments about the toggle switches not being true toggles, I don't own any of the DCS titles yet, so most of the time there isn't an on screen indicator, it would be nice if the toggles had an indicator to show which one is pressed, like an LED, perhaps make it optional, so it could be turned off by those that don't want LEDs or those who don't mind the current way it is. Great review and thank you for your input, it certainly helped me choose the HOTAS setup I was looking for. I have some questions for you, it sounds like your very slightly bias when it comes to the rudder pedals :), but what would you recommend? Buying pedals and this HOTAS? Or saving the money and using the twist rudder instead? Would you say there is a significant difference between sensitivity and comfort between the two rudder setups?

very good review mate keep em coming

Congrats Saitek, a well made hotas for the people.

Thx for the Review :-) greetings from Germany

Fun fact.. The dual stage trigger on a MH-60S controls the Comms. First stage is ICS (Internal comms system) and the second one is the Radio.

I have an X52 and now you are making me want to buy an X55. Darn you!

Hey foogle, another great vide as usual :) , i was wondering have you flown aircraft like the dash 8 and 777 with this joystick, and if so do you prefer to fly them with your yoke or the x55 ?

I have been looking around for a new joystick for a while and when I heard about the x-55 I get very excited but didn't think it would be this good! Can't wait until it gets to sweden :)

Thank you for the review. I have just one quick question. Would you recommend some kind of light rubber to put under them so they don't move around the table or do you think I should screw them since I'll have some intense dogfights in Star Citizen and Elite? Thanks.

Thanks Froogle. Would it be possible for you to share your DCS: Black Shark profile for the X55?

Because i'm interesting in this product:Can you lock the twist rotation of the joystick and is it twist it self when yo do fast maneures (i have this experience on my old st290 pro.)?

Great review.

Really good joystick. I'm looking forward to buying it. I especially like the throttle. The 8 way hats and mouse joy are good for those who do not have trackir.

One thing I would suggest Froogle(Elite: Dangerous), is your pedals control the yaw, use toe right toe brake for thrust up and left toe brake for thrust down. You then use the twist axis on your stick as thrust left/right.

Nice flying man!

Question: In the previous Saitek controllers I have an issue with input controls. Jumping around with small throttle movements and rotary controls. Have they fixed those issues with the new X-55? Current Controller for me is X-52.

Hello Frooglesim, I thought I would give you a little update on the status of 2 X-55 sets my hubby and I purchased during the Saitek pre-release. Bare in mind that your review was a major reason for our X-55 selection. We have used both of these units for DCS, World of Warplanes, IL2 BOS, and now Star Citizen Arena Commander. We have logged about 50-60 hours of actual flight time on these units. They are wonderfully set up ergonomically and can be configured to work well for anything that flies. The problem that arises will be the quality of materials and craftsmanship, for those who have invested in these. Unit #1 (husband's) started doing erratic button presses without him touching it in March of 2015. We opened up the throttle base to find that 4 of the wires from various switches were pinched upon assembly, causing short circuits between switches with use and time. One wire for one of the potentiometers was completely severed. Unit #2 (my own set) lost several button functions on the throttle in April of this year. We opened the up the throttle base to find that 7 of the 14 tiny 24 AWG wire bundle routing down through the right throttle handle to the base cards had been completely severed by the geared potentiometer. This was completely due to terrible wire management, poor materials selection (cheap), and obviously non-existent quality assurance from Saitek. The wire bundles bundles were wrapped in MASKING TAPE as protection, from the manufacturer. The wire bundles for the throttle switches on both handles move precariously adjacent to the geared potentiometers for each throttle axis. Eventually, the bundles will work their way into the gears and get severed or pinched (causing open/short circuits). If one is to do the math on this, one will come to understand that these units will cost you $4.50 - $5.00 per actual flight hour. This does not sit well well with us, nor should it with your followers and subscribers. Saitek REALLY needs to invest in higher quality materials and a functional Quality Assurance Program. If they need to charge a little more for a better quality standard, so be it. We are both very disappointed in the overall wasted investment. We have both now ordered the 'highest quality' units we could find - Thrustmaster Warthog HOTAS + Rudder Pedals. We will not make this mistake twice... Respectfully, Breezy1

Got mine today!!!

is there anywhere I can get your profiles for the x55 due to buy one soon, would rather just get in game then spend ages setting profiles. Thanks

Hi, froogle. I love your videos. Just one question: is this compatible with mac?

Does your metal rotary on the left side of the first throttle turn normal? Mine turns like crap.

This guy loves to trim! Never actually played a flight sim before, but considering getting one of these for Star Citizen. Guess shall wait to see if it's as sim like as people hope.

Ordered mine today 😊

great video!!

Hi. Just watching this, I knew I'd seen the Huey in a Froogle video somewhere. What mission were you flying please? Thanks.

How has it held up? I've read a lot of Amazon reviews talking about the buttons on the stick getting intermittent "clicks" when they did press it, etc due to how the stick is constructed being able to detach the change the spring, the contacts are surface contacts and seem prone to being inconsistent. I'm looking to maybe upgrade my old X-52 within the next year or so, so if the ability to detach causes connection issues, I would plan to steer clear of this one. While being able to change/replace the spring is an awesome concept, considering it was a weak point of the X-52, solid contacts shouldn't be sacrificed to make it happen. So other options would be the Thrustmaster Warthog or the stick RSI is making for Star Citizen.

Ah it has a twist ^_^ thank you. I was looking at the warthog as I play a lot of Space Flight sim (X3 Albion Prelude, FreeSpace endgen games, StarShatter and soon Star Citizen) and my old stick broke so I tried the X52 pro but that caused the computer to freeze up when shutting down when it had been connected. So I just got this and like the looks of it from this but I will wait and see how it goes as you where doing a lot of fine movment and Space Sims generaly are a lot faster needing tighter turns and the twist rudder is normaly made into a roll instead as with it still as a rudder it would be to inpresice to target but that is me getting off topic and a little into the question of is it got a good linier movment across it's whole range or does it stop before you get to the side of it's full movment?

Are the 2 throttle axis equiped with hall effect sensors?

Question will this Flight controller works well on Mac CPU / X-Plane 10? Please Help thanks

Great review, do you think having to take your hand off the joystick to use the mouse is a major disadvantage of the X-55 versus a yoke? I am debating between the Saitek Cessna yoke and this for FSX/P3D flying...

Hello (again) Froogle. I'm looking to buy this stick and I wondered if your opinion on this stick has changed since this video. i've read quite a few complaints on it and wondered if you had encountered any so far.

great review +frooglesim thanks, by the way, how are you controlling the camera? I mean inside the cockpit during flight, not the external view. Are you using this joystick or another device?

Nice review Froogle, I look forward to you reviewing the software, my x65f got shelved due to horrible software, I much prefer target software from thrustmaster hopefully saitek have something comparable now.

So what would you recommend this one or the X-52 pro?

What about the size of the joystick? I'm thinking about buying one but I want to be sure that it fits my hand. I know you have said that it fits your hand well but how big are your hands? It may be much to ask but I think it would be great if you could measure the width and length of your hand to give us an idea.

Good review

Judging on what you reviewed on it, since I have never actually used a rhino, The Rhino seems like an excellent Joystick for beginners or people with low budget( In most cases both). A good HOTAS that is comfortable and has a well suited price. It is definitely a step up from say an x-52 or 3d pro. The one thing I have yet to find is a good Force Feedback HOTAS. If you have found something, have any thoughts, or have an idea on why that is please let me know. (p.s. I'm a huey pilot and it is in no cases easy to fly because there is no autopilot flying it for you.)

Great review Froogle! A question... you mentioned the pinky 'modifier' in the video but I could find no mention of it in the X-55 H.U.D. manual that I downloaded from Saitek. Can the pinky button be used as a 'shift' or modifier in conjunction with the other switches to assign them a different function? My HOTAS software from another supplier is capable of this and I like to know that the X-55 is capable of this. Cheers!

Looks really good, trouble is we cant even pre-order it in the UK :-(

Frooglesim, I know you're a bit of a wizz with these and I've tried to follow your instructions but I have a problem....PLEASE HELP! I have been trying to set up my X55 using the programming software for a couple of different flight simulators and I regularly come across the same problem which causes my computer to crash or hang. I program one of more of the button to make a key press, but it seems this key press is being continually applied, like if I held my finger on the button. How do I get the software to just make one key press when I flick the Slider for instance on the throttle? Thanks in advance.

im buying this joystick but i can also buy rudder padels and trackir5 with the joystick or upgrading my pc from an amd fx 8320 to an i5 4670k with the joystick, what would be smarter?

I love your videos! I bought this stick recently and was super excited about it. However, I'm having a lot of trouble getting this work with windows 8.1 64bit. What operating system were you using with yours?

Hi, great video! I was just wondering if anyone here could help me? I have just purchased the Saitek X-55 Rhino HOTAS system of which I love using. But I have noticed an issue with the throttle, I am not getting the full range of throttle motion within the simulator that I happen to be using at the time. I have found when I am in Microsoft FSX, I can’t bring the throttle down to 0% power or go up to full throttle (stops at around 90%) When I use helicopter I can’t land as the throttle power will not go down to 0%. This also occurs in IL2 Forgotten Battles in a similar way but the throttle will not go below 50% power. I have tried calibrating the throttle using both Simulators built in calibration software as well as the software provided for the X-55. When I push the throttle back & forwards, the icon on the graph moves from one corner to the other with no issues (where you can set curves) The throttle unit itself is fine, I have the friction knob set to its loosest position & can move the throttles back & forwards with no problem. The problem only occurs within the simulator. I have looked all over the internet for an answer to this but have been unable to do so. Help!!

Which spring did you use out of those available when you came to fly the helicopter please?

Does the throttle have an afterburner mod like on the warthog?

Saitek has great features, and a good prices. The build quality has been the biggest issue I have had with their products - an Cyborg twist stick and a Cyborg Rat. The Rat lasted maybe 6 months, the shortest of any premium mouse I have bought, and the Cyborg stick's buttons started sticking with not that much use. Their stuff just doesn't seem to last (not just my experience, but what I have read from many users of products like the x52). FYI, the Logitech G940 controller does have twist knobs (on the joystick base) that can be used for trim. Not that the G940 doesn't have it's own problems.

What do you use as your push to talk?

Also shopping for hotas, is recommended

hi could you tell me what game your playing looks good

I'm waiting for an updated model with a two stage trigger and a 4 way hat on the handle.

Hiya froogle, I sent you a message about a month ago, wondering if you'd be willing to share your X55 profile for DCS A10C. Just curious. I really like your videos. Keep up the good work!

I only fly the pmdg 737ngx in fsx and I'm currently looking for a new yoke/joystick that insn't crazy expensive. Would you recommend it to me??

Hi Froogle a couple of things, I have just bought that stick brand new today and have been trying to set it up but basically have two problems one which is a mechanical one and the other trying to set up the RTY3 as an elevator trim. FIrst of all the friction knob by the side of the throttle lever cannot be moved and I loath to try and really force it, so can you tell me if it is supposed to be like that or do you believe I have a damaged throttle quadrant. The other problem is how on earth did you set up that rotary as a trim wheel because I have no clue, this is my first adventure into this type of controller, usually I just buy a cheap stick and plug it in, no programming so I totally lost and would appreciate if you could do a small video on how to achieve that. Thanks in advance. Sorry forgot to mention that the throttle levers are very hard to move so not good.

Nice review. Just a quick question, would you create a profile in the programming software and launch that, or would you 'program' it in the 'simulator'??

What is the simulator with helicopters?

Nice video and nice joystick...!!!

Hello! You dont happend to know where I can find a profile for the X55 to fly DCS UH-1H Huey ? Ive been searching for a while now and Id rather want a preset profile seeing as im not very good at putting up one myself :S

dude i just purchased the dcs module uh1h and i need help setting up my own x55 rhino w/ it. first time in dcs and i havn't got a clue what to do

Excellent review ..It even helped you fly the Huey ..lol

hello, thank you for your review a lot! Have a simple question I'd like have your reply on: do you think this set could be good in Il2 1946?

I need help programming buttons on my extreme three-d pro for DCS

BTW has the windows 8.1 compatibility been fixed with any driver updates?

What do you play with this?