I know that a couple of us were during the build up to the release of Prepar3D v3 were talking about the troubles that we were having with our Pro Flight hardware and Windows 10. I checked back with the Mad Catz site for driver downloads and found their download page for Windows 10 beta drivers.

 

http://www.madcatz.com/downloads/beta/index.html

 

I previously found an FAQ article about Windows 10 beta drivers for Saitek HOTAS flight sticks, but it appears that this new download page offers beta drivers and software for the Pro Flight Yoke as well. I'm at work as I type and download the driver so I can't test them yet. My suggestion would be to uninstall any currently installed drivers and software, reboot, then install the beta driver.

 

I'm hoping the driver fixes the problem with Windows slowing down to the point of freezing every time I unplug my yoke. The issue appears to have been fixed as reported in the beta driver for the Saitek HOTAS hardware.

Thank you for this; I will try it out. Mad Catz did point me to a Windows 10 beta driver last week, which I tried out. However, this beta driver had the same problems as before. Hopefully, the driver one gets from the Win 10 beta window resolves this issue.

 

Frans

A good resource to follow driver development is the facebook site of the mad cats:

 

https://www.facebook.com/SaitekProFlight

 

Kind regards, Michael

A good resource to follow driver development is the facebook site of the mad cats:

 

https://www.facebook.com/SaitekProFlight

 

Kind regards, Michael

Cool. I'll like that page so I can keep up to date.

 

It looks like they announced a beta driver release on September 28th for the Pro flight yoke.

Interestingly, no one has yet said that this beta driver actually works, even on the Facebook site.

 

Edit: If this driver came out on 28 Sept, then this is probably the same driver I was given by Mad Catz last week. This was worse than before. Nevertheless, I will still try it out.

 

Frans

Interestingly, no one has yet said that this beta driver actually works, even on the Facebook site.

 

Frans

Noticed that as well. There are a lot of comments asking about where their driver for the Cessna yoke or other non-post-related hardware was, but noone saying anything about if the driver fixed anything.

 

Time for us to try it and post something useful. :wink:

Although I haven't been able to test the drivers in-flight yet, I have noticed that Windows 10 doesn't hang on booting with the yoke plugged in.

On my system, Windows 10 never hung up on booting with the yoke plugged in. My problem occurs when I unplug the yoke; even after I have powered down the computer and then unplug the yoke, the first boot fails and the second boot succeeds.

 

Frans

It works!! I've got home and installed the beta driver after a clean uninstall and reboot of the old Windows 8 driver, and my slowdown/freezing of Windows 10 is gone. Hooray! :smile:

I'm going to plug in my throttle quadrant and pedals and see if that changes anything....

 

Update: I tested the yoke with the throttle plugged in and it works very well with no problems when unplugged. I then tried with the pedals plugged in as well, but it failed. Windows 10 hung and slowed down and became unresponsive. I had to hard reset to fix it. So it looks like the pedals are still a work in progress.

Edited October 6, 201510 yr by niyoko

I must be doing something wrong. I installed the beta driver just now and I still have driver version 7.0.7.9 (2011). Do I have to uninstall the old driver first? What version do you have, may I ask?

 

EDIT: I uninstalled the 7.0.7.9 driver and downloaded and executed the beta driver (it is version 7.0.7.44), but I still have 7.0.7.9.

 

I obviously need help!

 

Frans

I am wondering if the beta driver has indeed been installed, but that it does not recognize my yoke, which is a Saitek Cessna Yoke. niyoko, do you have the regular or Cessna yoke?

 

Frans

This is text that I copied from Madcatz instructions for updating drivers. It works for me, I have done installs of both beta drivers. Hope it helps if you have not ran across these before.

 

-----------------------------------

 

General Process to Ensure Clean Installation.

 

In addition to this general process, please review Device specific notes below that will need to be carried out.

 

Go to Control Panel > Programs and Features and uninstall:

Saitek/Mad Catz Programming Software

Saitek Direct Output, or any additional software related to your product from Saitek/Mad Catz.

Go to Control Panel > System > Device Manager:

Locate the section called Programming Support and open it by clicking the little arrow next to it.

 

Right click and uninstall each entry in Programming Support.

When prompted, select the option to delete the driver from the system.

 

Reboot your PC.

Plug in/connect your product.

Install the new product driver.

Install the new programming software.

 

 

 Device Specific Installation Notes

 

X52, X52 Pro and X65f - Windows 10, 64 bit – During stage 4 the driver may not over install correctly due to an older signed driver taking priority over the beta version. To resolve this:

Hold down the shift key on your keyboard, keep it held down.

Click the Start button, click power and then click restart.

You can release the Shift key.

You will be presented with a light blue screen with some options.

Select Troubleshoot > Advanced Options > Start up Settings, then click restart.

 

When the Startup Settings screen appears press F7 on your keyboard.

Windows will continue to load as normal.

 

Rerun the driver installation.

 

When prompted, click the install driver anyway option, to get the latest version installed correctly.

Note! If you change USB port after carrying out this process, the older driver will again get installed. To resolve this, just rerun the driver installation program.

 

X52 Pro - Windows 10, 32 bit – During stage 4, Direct Output service may not get installed. This is crucial for the MFD to function correctly. To resolve this:

Go to the Windows folder on the main hard drive.

Go into Temp\Saitek\Saitek_X52Pro_Flight_Controller_7_0_41_10_x86_Drivers\Msi.

Double click the DirectOutput installer icon to install the service.

A successful installation will show DirectOutput 7.0.41.10 in Control Panel > Programs and Features.

 

All Device Software - Windows 10, 32 and 64 bit – If this is the first time you have installed software from Saitek, .Net framework will need to be installed by Windows. This will be asked for either during installation, or the first time you run the Profile Editor application. Once this has installed you may need to rerun the software installation application to get correct functionality.

   

Testing Profiles on all devices and versions – If the profile editor window is open whilst testing profiles in games, this will impede the profiling as it causes an output conflict between the editor and the game. Best practise is to either:

Test profile commands using the test feature in the profiler editor.

Activate the profile, close the profile editor application, and then test commands in notepad, or directly in–game.

 

http://madcatz.kayako.com/Knowledgebase/Article/View/604/46/windows-10--saitek-hotas-beta-drivers-and-software-release%C2'>

I followed the procedure, but my driver did not get updated (likely because the beta driver is not intended for the Cessna Yoke). I think that it is time to give up, for now. I have been surviving by disabling the driver after exiting P3Dv3, and re-enabling it when I start P3Dv3.

 

Frans

I must be doing something wrong. I installed the beta driver just now and I still have driver version 7.0.7.9 (2011). Do I have to uninstall the old driver first? What version do you have, may I ask?

 

EDIT: I uninstalled the 7.0.7.9 driver and downloaded and executed the beta driver (it is version 7.0.7.44), but I still have 7.0.7.9.

 

I obviously need help!

 

Frans

Yes, I did just uninstall the drivers using the "Programs and Features" app in the Control Panel for the yoke and pedals. After that I rebooted, then installed the Windows 10 beta drivers. I haven't confirmed the version number through Device Manager yet thought, but my problems with the yoke are gone.

 

I followed the procedure, but my driver did not get updated (likely because the beta driver is not intended for the Cessna Yoke). I think that it is time to give up, for now. I have been surviving by disabling the driver after exiting P3Dv3, and re-enabling it when I start P3Dv3.

 

Frans

I think that might be the issue. I believe the Saitek rep on Facebook mentioned that the beta driver was for Pro Flight Yokes only, and that the team were working on a separate version for the Pro Flight Cessna Yoke. What the difference is in hardware, I don't know, but they need different drivers.

 

I've got a Pro Flight Yoke and Cessna Pedals. The shop only had those in stock so i mismatched.