A good joystick makes all the difference when playing flight simulation games. The Saitek Aviator is a better-than-average joystick, with innovative button design and two throttle controls.

Although it might seem excessive at first glance, the extra throttle lever is very useful. The most obvious reason is to control individual engines on dual-engine aircraft.

This makes taxiing much easier as the engines can be used for steering. Alternatively, Microsoft Flight Simulator can use the other throttle lever for a wide variety of controls including engine mixture (like the choke on a car), flaps and propeller pitch (a bit like the gears on a car). A handy button on the left-hand side can be used to lock the throttles together.

The joystick itself has the normal assortment of buttons: a trigger, three buttons and an eight way hat switch (like a mini-joystick) on the top.

Unlike most buttons on the bases of joysticks, the buttons on the base of the Aviator joystick look more like switches, moving up and down. Doubling up these buttons is a great idea for controls like flaps as it is easier to remember one switch for extending and retracting flaps than two separate buttons.

Both the dual throttles and switches worked very well in the new Microsoft Flight Simulator X and Lock-On. However, there’s no force-feedback.

A mode selector switch works with the supplied Saitek software to add extra functions to the buttons. Different assignments can be made for normal flight, air combat or ground attack in games such as Lock-On.

For flight-sim fans, this is a great way to get the best out of your flying time.

Also consider
Steel Series Steelkeys 6G gaming keyboard
Overall: Great build quality, but the Steelkeys 6G is expensive for the features it offers
Rating: 3
Price: £70

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