Review: CH Products Eclipse Yoke

First Impressions

CH Product's Eclipse Yoke arrives well-packed in an attractive box. Included in the box are a Quick Start brochure, mounting clamps and clamps screws, and of course the yoke, which sports a 7-foot USB cable. Oddly, while the Quick Start brochure talks the user through installation procedures it lacks any mention of Control Manager, CH Product's well-polished and user-friendly controller programming software. Considering that easy programmability is one of the stand-out features of the CH product line, the omission came as a surprise.

If you wish to use Control Manager [and you do - Ed], you'll need to grab the latest version from the CH web site. Version 4.51 has been released specifically to support the Eclipse Yoke, and the CH Hangar web site is where you'll find both a download link and installation instructions.

Once everything is hooked up, it’s time to try the buttons and axes in the Game Controllers applet located in the Windows Control Panel. This is good for an initial quick check that your controller is recognized (by DirectX) before installing the Control Manager software. Device calibration should be left for Control Manager.

Control Manager v4.51, Eclipse Yoke software, and drivers were all installed without hassle. All that was left was to mount the Eclipse Yoke to my desk. Mounting is via two knurled knobs that place clamping bars in tension on the underside of the yoke. The clamping bars come with extenders that increase the length of the clamping system and also decrease the minimum desk thickness required for a good hold. CH Products states that the recommended desk thickness for the yoke is ¾” to 2-¼” (19mm to 57mm). Indeed, these extenders were a welcome addition in my situation, since my desk is only ¾” thick. Just about all of the available travel in the clamping system was used up when I mounted the Eclipse Yoke to my thin desktop.

Once you manage to clamps things down, the system works beautifully; the yoke never moved in the course of my testing. However, it can be frustrating to keep the clamping bars aligned perpendicular to the desk edge while tightening them; there is no mechanism to keep them square, and as a result they tend to rotate with the tension screw. Every time I mount the Eclipse Yoke, I feel as if I need three hands to get started — one to hold the yoke to my desk, a second to turn the screw, and a third to keep the clamping bar where I want it. Once the first clamp is tightened, the yoke is held to the desk and it’s easier to manage the second bar. A top-down clamping system would be a nice feature to have on the Eclipse Yoke.

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