Has anyone been able to use the X52 controller with Freespace 1? I turned the deadzone setting all the way down in-game, but the deadzone is still huge. Makes it really hard to track any targets and ruins the game, really.

Check your joystick configuration software, maybe the deadzone setting is too high there.

There are no deadzones set according to Windows, and I set it all the way down in-game, but it's still huge. I guess I will try a gamepad.

Strange, i don't remember having deadzone problems with my X52; however i'm not entirely sure if i tried that with the native GOG executable or if i went straight with the FSOpen port... the latter, in any case, should work fine.