For those of you who desire greater direct input compatibility and trust a Microsoft beta, the beta DX8 distro is available on several websites; I can't remember exactly where, but I've been running it for a little bit and it seems to work okay. Joystick support is indeed better, as less programs have difficulties interacting with the HAL for a Joystick (I had foudn that several games would not even recognize a joystick and now have no such difficulties)