Alright so the subject was literal, I have windows 98 Se and I can’t get my joystick(Microsoft sidewinder 3d pro) to work, I plug it in to my gameport which is included on my soundcard (turtle beach Montego II) and it always says “Not connected” I tried using my gravis gamepad but also got “Not connected” both of these worked when I used to play X-Wing vs Tie Fighter on my old windows 95 computer, I even tried both of these controllers on my fathers computer also a win98se machine with the same sucess. Am I doing something wrong is there soemthing I don’t know about or are my controllers just broken?
I’m so disappointed.
This I can’t help with.
…and I hope your joystick works soon
From the Start button, Go to Control Panel -> system --> Device Manager and check under game controllers. If your joystick is listed there, then activate it. If not, then click on add new hardware from the control panel, and be ready to upload drivers from your floppy disk or your Windows 98SE CD-ROM.
Well my joystick is not listed under game controllers but it does say Montego II gameport interface.
I get the “not connected” thing when I go to gaming options which is located in the control panel
Probably won’t do it but worth a shot:
http://www.propsim.com/wb-training/tech-controllers.html
or put in a new SE driver
1.In the Control Panel, double-click on the System icon.
The System Properties window will open.
2.Click on the Device Manager tab, and then on the + sign next to Sound, video, and game
controllers.
You should see (Microsoft sidewinder 3d pro listed under Sound, video, and game controllers.
Note: Some of the newer Gameports will not show up here.
3.Click on (Microsoft sidewinder 3d pro and then on the Properties tab.
4.Click on the Resources tab and look for an Input/Output range value of 201. This is the
standard or default value for a gameport.
If you are installing another sound card, gamecard, or other component with a gameport, be sure to
disable the one you don’t want to use before installing the new one. Otherwise, Windows will either
have a conflict, or assign a different I/O range value to it and make it inoperative. Some older sound
cards might have a jumper to disable their gameports. By all means use it. This is the best way to
disable it.
The newer "plug and play" sound cards have no way to disable the gameport. Therefore you must
assign a different I/O range value other then 201 to it, and then check the Disable in this hardware
profile checkbox on the Gameport Joystick properties screen. Then you are ready to install the
new gameport card.
After installing your new gameport and re-booting your computer, be sure to check its properties in the
Device Manager tab, and confirm its I/O value of 201.I hereby nominate the OP as the world’s worst pickup line. 
And it’s not every man’s joystick that captures my attention, either…
Depending on what your old machine and new one are, you may simply be screwed. The problem is, the sidwinder 3d pro doesn’t work well with higher bus speeds on newer systems, no matter what you do.
Mine worked perfectly fine with a Pentium Win '95 machine–when I moved along to a P3–no such luck. I could browbeat the settings into treating it just as a four-button stick with another axis for the rudder twist, but even that remained extremely twitchy, refusing to be recognized on some boot-ups.
Any modern USB-port stick should work just fine, though. I use the Saitek X36, which is probably a bit of overkill as its one of those fully-programmable HOTAS monsters, but it’s fun overkill.