When I play free flight once I pick the operation, it transfers to base then immediately pops out to windows with a "debug error fatal" box and states process events or somethin or other? Anyone experience this before?

I too get this problem, has anybody found a fix yet? I'm running in vista64
UPDATE: The precise error is "error in process_event, unknown event XXXX" whereby XXXX is a different number every time

Okay, things are getting weirder. I have kind of narrowed it down to controller incompatibility. If I run the game with my saitek X52 and an xbox 360 wired controller plugged in, the game runs fine, but it won't let me select the X52 from the options menu. If I unplug the xbox controller however, I get the afore mentioned crash. This applies to all game modes, not just free flight.
So, any ideas?

Same problem here... I have a Saitek X52 and anytime I start a mission as soon as I hit any key on the keyboard or any button on the joystick I have the same problem.
I tried also unplugging anything from the USB but the joystick, but still having this issue.
It's weird because I can use the mouse thingy on the X52 throttle to navigate through the menus without getting the error...
Is it a joystick problem or what?

I've still not heard back from support here yet, but according to the saitek forums, the X-52 normally works fine in EEAH. So I'm pretty clueless at the minute. I'll let you know if I hear anything helpful.

Does anyone have any news about this issue?
I'm a bit disappointed, because after buying the game since the only joystick I have is the X52, I never got a chance to play it properly. It's really a shame...

I have the exact same problem with my X52. Kind of regretting that I bought it today :(

After scouring the web, and trying a couple of things, I finally gave up and bought EECH in addition to my original EEAH purchase. Using the great mod at www.eechcentral.com now makes this actually a really impressive sim, and it works great with my joystick setup.

If you don't plan to purchase EECH as well, I'd say keep your hands off EEAH.

This has all been fixed, and works great with my x52 pro. The basics are covered by EECH recognizing my stick and throttle, the rest you just use the SST programming software DL from saitek's website and you define say the "fire e" button to 'r' to start the rotor spinning as 1 example. By default the trigger is good for shoot, but the weapon selector is the rocket launch button, hope there are different keyboard commands for cannon and rockets; damn old games sometimes!! but TBH I wouldn't know just started playing thanks to the updates that came out in 2012 or 2014 whatever IDK date but who care it works!

Instructions and links are given in the picture instructions,jpg that's attached, just right click save to PC, then rename .jpg to .zip and unzip it. If you don't know how to do anything JFGI. If you don't know what JFGI is, well, JFGI. Ok I know sorry forgot you were stupid and I'm too mean sometimes, so ya if you don't know what anything means or how to do something, just look it up. AKA google it.
if it doesn't work out as intended here are the 2 most important links:

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO UPGRADE:
simhq[DOT]com[/]forum[/]ubbthreads[DOT]php[/]topics[/]3185855

MAIN EECH THREAD:
simhq[DOT]com[/]forum[/]ubbthreads[DOT]php[/]forums/[1]3[/]1/EECH_EEAH[DOT]html

ok if you're an idiot, remove the '[' & ']' brackets, and replace all 'DOT''s with '.' so you make it a link again