Subject: Saitek Cyborg Evo with UR-F98 (an IR headmovement tracking headset).

KEYWORDS: Saitek Cyborg Evo joystick profile review button mapping UR-F98 Union Reality headset headgear budget low cost bargain trackIR track IR HOTAS

Hello and welcome to Escar's review of a budget trackIR&HOTAS solution. :P

Since not all of can afford this:

X52

or this:

X45

or this:

TrackIR 4

not to mention this:

Pit

it's a good idea to find some budget replacement for those, that'll give at least some, hopefully most, of their functionality.

I'm one of the people who value their money, especially since it doesn't grow on trees, so when I made this:

and still found some spare change in my pocket, I decided to look around for some good joystick and something that would give me trackIR functionality.

I bought the following:

Saitek Cyborg Evo

and

Union Reality UR-F98

not even knowing if the latter will work with LO-mAC. If you already bought it and that's why you're reading this post... breathe, it works.

If you're still looking to buy that stuff, know that I got it all for ~44 euro with shipment, so if anyone tries to sell you this for 2x this price... they're probably trying to rip you off.

To the point...

First about Saitek.

Before finally buying Saitek Cyborg Evo I was considering two of it's competitors from Logitech. They promised similar functionality for half the price. Don't buy them. I didn't test them myself, but after asking around and googling around I've read a lot of stuff from people complaining about the precision of those sticks. I already owned 3 Logitech's and all of them broke down pretty quickly (fortunatelly they returned my money). I was a bit hasitant at first to spend 2x the price of Logitech's for Saitek which on paper offered same thing, but now I'm glad that I bought Saitek.

Joystick comes with an installation CD which contains a profiler which in theory allows setting up shifted profiles with two shift buttons that the joystick offers. For some reason however this functionality is somewhat bugged in LO-MAC so it's best to uninstall the profiler and use LO-MAC's internal profiling, which is much more versitile. One thing that I noticed disappearing after uninstalling the profile were the aditional, combined directions for POV (like up-left, down-right, only 4 basic ones remained up, down, left, right). But it's not much of a pain in the ass.

Scrapping aditional software, joystick installation under Windows 2000 or higher is seamingless. Just plug it in, go to Control Panel/Game Controllers to calibrate and voila. 12 buttons, POV, throttle and twist handle ready to do your bidding. Unlike Logitech sticks, readouts for Saitek, once calibrated, are rock solid. When you let go of the stick the position marker stays glued to the center, not woobling madly around.

Joystick itself has a very solid construction. Throttle moves like a well oiled telescope, buttons on the base are large and give a reasurring "click". I was surprised to see that those buttons are lit (nice red). As in most Saitek's handle is adjustable. It's also very solid and when you configure it for your hand it fits like a glove. Head of the stick contains trigger, 5 buttons and POV. Head panel with 5 buttons and POV can be tilted with a screw, both up and down and sideways. Very nice touch. Buttons are placed in such a way that you don't accidentally press anything while trying to press something else.

One minus is the fact that the buttons on the right side of the base are not so easily accessible. You have to take your thumb of the head of the stick to activate those buttons with your little finger. It made me wonder at first why did they place those three buttons in sucha position, instead of putting them on the left side for easy access. Forgot that all Saitek's are designed for both left and right handed people. :)

Now UR-F98.

I really wanted to have something that would give me TrackIR functionality, but I couldn't bare the thought of spending 145$ for the thing + shippment, which would probably make it 200$ total. Thus I've begun searching for something else and I stumbled upon this. The firm was totally unknown to me aswell as their product. After some googling I've found out that it's located in Italy and that the users have a lot of problems with the drivers. This + the fact that this controller has to be connected to game port AND COM port... made me very uneasy regarding spending money on this stuff.

As it turned out to be... I didn't have to worry.

Thing comes with a driver CD, but you can completely forget about it and just configure it yourself. Indeed, it attaches itself to game port and COM port, but the COM port is only used for ... aditional power the device needs to operate. So no friggin problems with IRQ and I/O's.

What interests you in the package is the receiver, which connects to the putter via game port (+COM for extra power). It also has two audio cables for front speakers and mic. Then you have a twin cable-set to connect the helmet to the receiver. Ports are color marked (grey and black) so there's no mistaking what goes where. Aditionally you have a controller gizmo which you connect to the receiver via cable and this gives you one slider + 4 buttons.

The only minus so far of the whole set is the fact that I have a really big head (that's what you get from reading too much :P ) and the helmet is not so big. Whole thing is plastic and fixed, scalability is assured by really big headphones (lot's of sponge there), so eventually whole thing fits even on my head, but I feel a bit squized in in (Note: This however gives an aditional "feel" to the game, when you stuck your head into the helmet, all sounds get quieted a bit, etc. New level of immersion. Family doesn't like it though, because I now set the volume a tad higher on my 5.1 Creative SB 5900 loudspeaker set... I don't use the audio connectors for the helmet, because I have a better mic on the desk and I don't want to ruin my ears by pumping all that volume directly into them + sound from my speaker set is much better).

Now... the installation in the system... COMPLETELY EASY. Go to Control Panel/Game Controllers and "Add" a controler. Make it a custom one, name it what da hell ever you want and make it a 4 button, 3 axis controller. System sees it as a joystick where your head movement are X/Y axis and the slider is a third axis while buttons are... seen as regular joystick buttons. The only diffrence in calibration is, that instead of moving the stick around, you have to move your head around while calibrating.

I encountered only one problem with calibration, which was some hypersensitivity on the Y axis and slider. I knew that behaviour from Logitech's and some other, cheap joysticks. You know the case, you keep the stick (in this case, your head) still and the marker keeps woobling around the screen madly. However I had no idea what was causing this in a set which has no ... stick.Regarding the Y axis I managed to get it more under control by correcting the receiver position (I used velcro strips to attach it to the top of my LCD) and calibrating it a couple times more. As for the slider... I guess I'll have to disassemble it and clean it a bit.

So, this gave me two controlers, one with X/Y axis (hand controled), throttle, twist handle, POV and 12 buttons and another with X/Y axis (head controled), throttle/slider and 4 buttons. As I said I didn't wanted to try to set it up with the producers profilers. The Union Reality software is really old (designed for Win98, IMHO) and I really didn't see any use for it, since the thing is seen by the system as regular joystick. The Saitek Software failed to cooperate (for me at lest) with LO-MAC. No worries though, since LO-MAC config allows for a VEEEEEEEEEEEEERY broad configuration.

First I tried to set up all axis. I tried using the slider on UR as a throttle at first and then as view zoom control, but due to it's hypersensitivity, I had to drop it for the time being. However while trying to use it I used velcro strips to attach the UR controller to the arm of my armchair and with the joystick on the right and this thing on the left it worked like a regular, two hand throttle&stick setup (although the left thing was fixed of course and the throttle was in slider).

For the head movement I used AX1 for vertical and AX0 for horizontal. Vertical had to be inverted. I encountered a problem with getting the thing to work which was finally solved by disabling "mouse view". Hypersensityvity kicked in again, so I had to fine tune the axis setup, to avoid constant view bobing. X axis worked perfect, whilst the Y axis still gave some trouble. After some fiddling I came up with the following (X marks the setting):

VERTICAL:

| | | | | X | | | | |

| | | | | X | | | | |

| | |X| | | | | | | |

HORIZONTAL:

| | | | | X | | | | |

| | | |X| | | | | | |

| | |X| | | | | | | |

IMPORTANT NOTE: For some reason sometimes Cyborg's POV starts interacting with the view, which combined with UR view control creates an effect as if you were going through some turbulence. It only happens when the "lost" directions of POV get activated. Then view starts to act strangely, but you can quickly reset it by pressing any of the view keys on the numpad. I'm pretty sure I'll be able to remove this effect if I install Saitek drivers again and remove up-left, up-right, down-left, down-right POV view references in the config.

For the moment I forgot about slider completely (NOTE: When I clean it and make it work ok, I'll probably make it a thrust, thrust lever on the stick will be view zoom control and I'll swap the location of trim settings with flap and airbrake settings betwen the UR and Cyborg base buttons, compared to the setup which I'll present below).

I've set up Saitek axis in a following way.

AX1 = pitch

AX0 = roll

ROT2= rudder

AX2 = throttle

I'm still tweaking those, but I got good results with following fine tuning (although I think, after some dogfighting, that I still have to lower deadzones and increase the curve, because I shoot to many bullets out the window):

PITCH:

| | | | | X | | | | |

| |X| | | | | | | | |

| | | | | X | | | | |

ROLL:

| | | | | X | | | | |

| |X| | | | | | | | |

| | | | | X | | | | |

RUDDER:

| | | | | X | | | | |

| |X| | | | | | | | |

X | | | | | | | | | |

THROTTLE (AS SLIDER!!):

default values.

Now the buttons. For the UR I used a setup for All flight modes:

1. wheel break

2. flaps up

3. flaps down

4. airbrake

Note, that I "velcro" it in such a way that button's 2 and 3 are in vertical position (slider is horizontal, positioned to the left).

When I get the slider to work correctly, I'll probably make it:

1. airbrake

2. trim up

3. trim down

4. reset trim

I fly mostly Su-33, so trim is VERY important for me.

For the Saitek I did some searching and came up with this thread:

http://forums.ubi.com/groupee/forums/a/tpc/f/73610606/m/6351041543/r/6351041543#6351041543

Included in it is a following joystick profile:

1) NAV mode-

* button 1(trigger)- wheel brakes

* button 2- MFD zoom in

* button 3- cycle through submodes- ENR, RTRN, LNDG

* button 4- MFD zoom out

* button 5- gear up and down

* button 6- flaps up and down

* button 7- airbrake

* button 8- arrestor hook

* button 9(left shift)- cycle through waypoints or airfields

* button 10(right shift)- drogue parachute

2) BVR mode-

* button 1- fire current weapon

* button 2- MFD zoom in

* button 3- lock on target

* button 4- MFD zoom out

* button 5- turn on/off radar

* button 6- switch to TWS mode

* button 7- cycle through weapons

* button 8- turn ECM on/off

* button 9- deploy chaff/flares

* button 10- jetisson external fuel tank

3) Helmet mode-

* button 1- fire current weapon

* button 2- toggle padlock view

* button 3- lock on target

* button 4- toggle cannon

* button 5- airbrake

* button 6- flaps

* button 7- cycle through weapons

4) Air tp ground mode-

* button 1- fire current weapon

* button 2- MFD zoom in

* button 3- lock on target

* button 4- MFD zoom out

* button 5- EOS on/off

* button 6- radar on/off

* button 7- deploy chaff/flares

* button 8- cycle through weapons

* button 9- cycle through targets on the MFD

* button 10- ECM on/off

It's not exactly about my version of Cyborg, but close enough to use it as sort of a reference.

NOTE: LO-MAC setup is a bit buggy. If you setup diffrent configs for various operational mods, it can sometimes screw up those settings so it's best to write down everything that you want to setup and then do it with one go, to avoid various "???" poping up. I didn't do it like that and then I had 5 take offs for a mission where I found out that in some modes rudder is stuck or that in HMTD mode my throttle stops responding.

Finally I decided to set up my stick according to the following profile (NOTE: as stated above, if all goes well with the UR slider, buttons 7,8,11 will go to the UR control and flaps and airbrake will go to 7,8 and I'll be thinking what to do with 11; at the same time I'll get two extra free buttons, 4 and 6, due to the fact that view zoom will be controlled by Cyborg's AX2 axis, because throttle will go to UR slider):

I NAV:

1. wheel break

2. toggle nav mode

3. toggle auto-throttle

4. view zoom out

5. toggle airbrake

6. view zoom in

7. trim up

8. trim down

9. toggle arrestor hook

10. toggle gear

11. reset trim

12. release drogue shute

POV RIGHT. toggle flaps

POV LEFT. next waypoint or airfield

POV UP. MFD zoom in

POV DOWN. MFD zoom out

II BVR:

1. fire

2. lock target

3. cycle weapons

4. view zoom out

5. center target designator

6. view zoom in

7. trim up

8. trim down

9. MFD zoom out

10. dispense chaff and flare

11. reset trim

12. MFD zoom in

POV RIGHT. target designator right

POV LEFT. target designator left

POV UP. target designator up

POV DOWN. target designator down

III VS/HMDT:

1. fire

2. lock target

3. toggle cannon

4. view zoom out

5. toggle airbrake

6. view zoom in

7. trim up

8. trim down

9. flaps down landing position

10. dispense chaff and flare

11. reset trim

12. flaps up

POV RIGHT. toggle EOS

POV LEFT. toggle active radar

POV UP. airbrake out

POV DOWN. airbrake in

IV. GROUND:

1. fire

2. lock target

3. cycle weapons

4. view zoom out

5. center target designator

6. view zoom in

7. trim up

8. trim down

9. MFD zoom out

10. dispense chaff and flare

11. reset trim

12. MFD zoom in

POV RIGHT. target designator right

POV LEFT. target designator left

POV UP. target designator up

POV DOWN. target designator down

NOTE: Ground mode is set up with Su-25 in thought, which I ocassionally fly when I really want to see some carnage. :>

Finally, some impressions from flying.

I'm pleased. :D Not to say overwhelmed, but pleased. Union Reality set is not trackIR, so I'm not expecting perfect behaviour from it, but I'm satisfied with the fact that in horizontal plane it works... perfect, whilst in vertical it produces some slight view bobing. Whole thing works well enough to be a great asset in dogfights or just regular flying. For the first time in the Flanker series I'm able to use HMTD mode as it's supposed to be used: I just look at the bugger, press button numer two and "drag" his sorry ass close enough to my 12've to get a hit with R-73s. So I'm glad that I bought it and I'm even somewhat happy with the fact that it's a helmet, because when I turn those speakers on and then muffle them a bit with those big ear-phones and basically put the thing on my head, I get this immersive feeling of wearing a helmet. :) I wonder if it would be possible somehow to configure the sound in such a way that voice would go through rear channels, then I could hook up the helmet to voice (radio) only and... it'd be like IRL, headphones for talking and the rest of the sounds... from the world (speakers).

A word of warning, this whole IR-head-tracking thingy requires some getting used to. REALLY. I didn't even realize, that when I pull up I subcounciously tilt my head up. I only noticed this when view got changed each time I pulled up, because the UR responded to my head movement. Also I had to learn to ignore things flashing in the corner of an eye, each time I tried to look at something in our reality and of course my pilot in game followed my gaze. I look at the calendar on the wall and on the LCD I got a view of my left wing. Annoying at first, everything comes down to getting used to it. Old habits are hard to kill, so even after couple of days, when I want to check the gauges, I first reach out to the "ins" button. Tilting the head a bit down is still a second thought but... in one months time I probably won't be able to fly without the helmet. And it really is something when I think "Hmm... let's look around" and I don't have to lift a finger from the stick or UR gizmo. All it takes is a slight move of the head. :)

As for the Saitek Cyborg Evo, I start to lean towards a conclusion that it's possibly THE BEST of sticks for simming in the low budget area. Logitechs suck, there's an unbridgeable gap between normal strick and X45 (financially wise), but the amount of buttons this stick offers and very nice throttle... makes it worth every penny. I'm not sure about other models with FF or wireless (AFAIR there are such other two). I'm not sure if they're worth buying (value/money), but I'm sure this one is. After this stick my next stick will probably be another Saitek, either one very similar to this one or a used X45 set from eBay or Allegro (Polish auction system, more popular in Poland then eBay).

All in all, for ~44 euro... I made a hell of a deal. I got a set with so many buttons that I hardly have to touch the keyboard at all and I got a newly discovered plane of freedom in the LO-MAC reality, thanks to the helmet. So if you're considering a new stick and you'd love to get a feel of what's it like to look around without having to push all the numpad buttons... go get this stuff. It's well built (khh... well, some objections to the earphones :P), it's good, it WORKS, it's easy to configure and .... what are you waiting for anyway? :)

NOTE: Warning, view does bob a bit. It's not PERFECT. But it is VERY GOOD. :) I'll try to post a quick movie maybe, from in-game, if I have the time. :)

Hmm... the end. Hope this post is not longer then my original sticky. That'd be some kind of record. :O

Damn. It didn't fit in one post. I knew it. Another one of my "longers". :P

EDIT:

I hope, you bunch of old timers, that I did not disappoint you with this post and that I've proven that I'm still the same guy with same wacky ideas (like that one: http://forums.ubi.com/groupee/forums/a/tpc/f/38610606/m/596002127/r/596002127#596002127 ... eh :( pics are gone... and I can't even find them on my HDD to upload them again... bugger. I still have the "throttle" though. But can't take pictures of it ATM, cos' me bro lended my camera to a friend and his friend broke the camera grrr.). :D :PP

BTW... today at work I started thinking about another thing... mmm... (see some other post). :)

Good job on documenting your experiences and sharing it to others.

Now all can grab a Head Tracking system, I guess.

Brilliant stuff there! I didn't even know that there is a tracking device like that available.. i'm sure this will be come in handy for all us poor students that spend 75% of our money on fridays and saturdays..:D

No problem. :D I said I'll do it, so it's done. :) And due to the fact that when I'm doing something, I'm trying to make it right.... :)

BTW, I'm not a student anymore, but I still value my money, so expect some more ideas from me. Infact, there's something that's been bugging me for over a year now, but only recently I stumbled upon a thread here, that made me really sink into the subject. Soo... expect another wacky idea. :)

Hey guys,

Man that brings back a lot of old memories. What an antique!

Unfortunately, the UnionReality Gear is really a piece of ****. I had one way back in 1997 and it really didn't work well. Extremely bullky and it just didn't work for beans. The TrackIR is 8 million times better.

I ended up ripping the headphones out replacing the speakers. I did paint it in camo though. I wish I had a pic of it.

As far as it being affordable, that's because (as far as I can tell) they are out of business and it is not made anymore. If you can find one, buy it to keep as a collectable.

For me, that kit was head-tracking gone really wrong. When I got my TrackIR I I tossed by UR Gear helmet in the trash.

Just my .02 cents.

Jason

Hey guys,

 

Man that brings back a lot of old memories. What an antique!

 

Unfortunately, the UnionReality Gear is really a piece of ****. I had one way back in 1997 and it really didn't work well. Extremely bullky and it just didn't work for beans. The TrackIR is 8 million times better.

 

I ended up ripping the headphones out replacing the speakers. I did paint it in camo though. I wish I had a pic of it.

 

As far as it being affordable, that's because (as far as I can tell) they are out of business and it is not made anymore. If you can find one, buy it to keep as a collectable.

 

For me, that kit was head-tracking gone really wrong. When I got my TrackIR I I tossed by UR Gear helmet in the trash.

 

Just my .02 cents.

 

Jason

As I said, this is a budget solution. :) I also wouldn't call it a piece of shit. It's pretty sturdy, works without problems and if it's indeed as old as you say, then I'm surprised that it's in such a good shape (looks brand new). I managed yesterday to reduce the hypersensitivity to a point where view only trembles a bit in a very "up" position. Did a test afterwards. Flying in circles, trying to keep an object on the ground always in the center of my view. Piece of cake. I had more problems handling the plane (kept going into too tight circles) then keeping the object fixed in the center of my view. Then I tried a dogfight without padlocking. No problems there either. Boogie zoomed pass me, I went into a tight turn and looked up... and there he was. Kept him in my line of sight untill I brought him to guns range and ... pufff. :)