The thrustmaster afterburner is a nice stick for people on a budget. It looks like a cheap toy, but is very well built. If you're not going to spend over $80 on a joystick, it's one of the best around. The original afterburner is only $50, the only difference I know of is that the Ab2 doesnt have a missile button cover, and it's black.
My favorite feature on it is the option for rudder control. You can either use a normal joystick twist, or lock the twist (The lock is very solid, when locked you'd never know it's a twist stick, unlike some other sticks that still have a lot of give to them) and use the rocker on the throttle. I've found the rocker to be MUCH better for flight sims, since moving the stick doesnt also inadvertantly move the rudder.
ALSO, if you use windows2000 or XP, most games don't have such nice joystick config options as AH does. Thrustmaster is one of the few joystick manufacturers outside of microsoft who has full-featured 2k/xp drivers, allowing deadzone and sensitivity curve adjustments.
