The 360 D-pad is actually horrendous. I bought a $60 Hori DOA4 stick just to play fighters and all X-box Live Arcade 2D style games. One major problem is with games like UMK3 you can't change the button layout at all. So with the Hori stick, I am screwed.
Also, my 360 and my roommate's as well just RROD 3 lights a week ago on the same exact hour.

His was a refurbished unit bought in April and had disk loading issues before it did it. Mine which I had for 2 years just had the occasional lockup on cut scenes with NG2 and one scene on Ace Combat 6 right before it died. Then one day, it just lights up. BTW, I keep my room just about always at 68 degrees and my system in open space. This is just ridiculous. So I am sending it off and requesting they give me the 65nm Falcon or Xenon chip set, whichever it is. I honestly think the 30% failure rate is actually higher. It is more like 100% due to time being the issue of just a matter of when your first model 360 dies, not if.