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Saitek X45 USB HOTAS
By Bob "Groucho" Marks

Article Type: Review
Article Date: September 26, 2001


Saitek X45 Joystick and Throttle

Movin' On Up

There comes a time in every flight simmer’s existence where they stop and say something like, “Hey, this ten-dollar CompUSA-brand translucent joystick really sucks.” The muttering of this profundity is inevitable, and it’s OK. It’s a sure indicator of improvement, a sign that you’re progressing in your appreciation of the finer technical aspects of the flight-simulation hobby. It’s either that, or a sign of a degenerative brain disease. I get the two confused sometimes. No matter. They’re basically the same thing.

What you need, bunky, is a no-kidding HOTAS rig. Wuzzat, you say? HOTAS is mil-speak for a Hands On Throttle And Stick controller; a set-up that has the ability to free you from constantly having to hunt-and-peck the old QWERTY board for important functions. With the advent of USB, programmability is easier and more powerful than ever. So what to do when the urge to upgrade your controller to a powerful HOTAS kicks in, yet your disposable income level forces you to budget your fun-stuff to the sub $80 level?

You’re in luck. Saitek has been making high-quality controllers for some time now, including the excellent and revered X35T/X36F (more commonly known as the “X36”) throttle/joystick combo. The old X36 was an excellent controller, especially for the retail cost of $99.00. OK, it’s not so old…the X36 can still be purchased on the Saitek website. Progress marches merrily along, however, and Saitek has recently launched a successor, the X45.


The King is Dead, Long Live the Unelected Figurehead

To be honest, I’m somewhat…well, saddened is a bit much…OK, lightly-bummed to see the X36 being phased out. The ol' Saitek X36 standby was my personal HOTAS of choice. The X36 was well made, comfortable, and highly programmable, and was really only limited by the inability to expand its functionality by including rudder pedals. The release of a hack by none other than controller guru Bob Church fixed that limitation. So, what could Saitek have possibly done to improve on the X36?

Old & New: The X36 (foreground) and X45 Joystick component. Note the difference in

The short answer is: not much. Well, not where it really matters, anyway. Most of the differences between the old guard and the X45 are cosmetic. You’ve got to give these guys credit for not screwing with success. While the new unit sports the same comfortable rubberized grips, generous throws, and large bases of the original, the family resemblance ends there.


Lookin' Good, Feelin' Good

Eschewing the low-key faux-military flat black look of its predecessor, the X45 is a late-career Elvis jumpsuit in comparison. The tops of the base plates look like, and may very well be, blue anodized aluminum. Techazoid-looking hieroglyphics depicting painfully obvious button designations (pointing at the trigger button, the helpful diagram says, “Trigger”) decorate the allegedly metal faces. Four of the seven fire buttons are now backlit in amber, apparently to make them easier to find when flying your favorite sim whilst wearing night vision goggles. All in all, the X45 looks much like the X36 with a George Lucas makeover.

Old & New, The Other Half: The X36 (left) and X45 Throttle component

Axe Me No Questions, I'll Tell You No Lies

Mechanically, the X45 differs a bit from its ancestor. The single most obvious difference is in the feel while actuating the control axes. Axi. Axeses. Whatever. Anyway, when you move the stick and throttle thingmies, it becomes immediately obvious that the feel isn’t as silky-smooth as the X36 was.

When initially fooling about with the controllers, fresh out of the box and not yet hooked up, this apparent lack of refinement was a bit off-putting. “Yuck,” I thought, “This is where they shaved their twenty bucks off of the price.” And, for all I know, it may be true. In actual use, however, it’s really not an issue. In fact, after a few hours of heavy use, I actually prefer the feel of the X45 over the X36. The increased throttle friction, for example, make finer adjustments easier to make because the tendency to “fall” into a detent position is decreased.

The new “cup-and-saucer” design for tensioning the joystick, while lacking in the clean sophistication of the original, is much stiffer and actually aids greatly in positively centering the stick. The inclusion of the rocker-type rudder control is the best possible way to implement yaw control, short of actual rudder pedals, naturally. As I mentioned, there is a hack available that allows the use of rudder pedals with the X36, and I’m sure with some massaging by persons much smarter than I that this hack can also allow pedals with the X45. In every control axis, the X45 is truly a joy to use.

The rocker-type rudder/yaw control

Mmmmmmm . . . Buttony!

The array of buttons, switches, and knobs festooning the X45 is staggering. The joystick proffers four fire buttons, two eight-way coolie hats, a rubberized pinkie “shift” switch, and a missile launch button with a flip-down safety cover. That missile launch safety cover finally makes sense, as the X36 was very weird in that one had to flip the safety cover down onto the switch so it could be actuated. Kudos to Saitek for fixing this bit of funkiness.

The throttle unit sports a slew of inputs with two fire buttons, a four-way hat, a mini-joystick type mouse controller, a pair of rotary knobs, and the aforementioned rocker rudder control. There are also a pair of mode switches, and three LEDs on the base showing which mode is active.
A pause to complain. While the overall ergonomics of the X45 is excellent and this HOTAS is extremely comfortable, with this many buttons and the like placement of some are bound to be a tad awkward. The upper eight-way hat on the joystick is a bit of a stretch to reach, even with my large hands. Whe reaching for it, I have a tendency to press the "A" fire button. Due care can make this occurance less common, but it's something to keep in mind.


The Soft(ware) Chewy Center



The clean, well designed SGE programming interface

These enormous number of possible button combination inputs—over 250 in all—is of limited utility without the programming software to back it up. The Saitek Gaming Extension (SGE) software is, without a doubt, the easiest to use and most intuitive controller programming software out there. The truly graphical interface make selecting a specific function for any button a point-and-click affair. Multiple commands and even sequenced commands are easily programmed. More advanced linear commands, sometimes made into a horribly Byzantine task by lesser software, is fairly simple in the SGE. Setting up radar elevation and azimuth steering using the rotary knobs, for example, is programmed in such an intuitive way that even I could figure it out in the first pass.

Trickier programming made e-z

A group of commands for any game is called a Profile, many of which are available in the Profiles Section of the Saitek web site. One very slick feature of the SGE is how it auto-launches the proper profile upon firing up your sim of choice. This eliminates the exasperated “D’Oh!” when one forgets to execute the programming software before launching the sim. Very trick.


The Verdict

I loved my old X36. It's a great peice of gear, and I can see little reason why current X36 USB owners would want to jump to the X45, unless you really have a thing for the flashy Neo-Tokyo look. That said, the new X45 HOTAS hasn't left the cluttered real-estate of my desk since I plugged them in a couple of weeks back. In fact, since I prefer the X45s stiffer springs of the stick and higher friction of the throttle, my trusty X36 sits forlornly on the floor rapidly collecting high-desert dust.

There are really no qualifiers necessary here: the X45 is a great choice for a HOTAS. With excellent ergonomics, a brain-warping spread of input choices, world-beating software, and good all-around quality, the X45 has few peers in any price range. Keep in mind that the X45 rings in at the cash register for twenty fewer bucks than the earlier X36 and it becomes clear that Saitek has unleashed a winner. The fact that it's a highly capable yet very affordable choice, at the suggested retail of $79.95US, just makes the X45 rig that much suh-wheeter.


Saitek X45




Reviewer's Spec:
  • CPU: Pentium4 1.7GHz
  • OS: WinMe
  • RAM: 384MB PC-800 RDRAM
  • Video: ASUS GeForce3 64MB