I just wanted to chime in on something regarding fightpads for Cyner (or anyone else considering a fightpad). Personally, I think those SF4 fightpads are garbage. The d-pad is supposed to be more responsive, but I couldn't tell a huge difference. In fact, some of the diagonals (9 and 3 mainly) wouldn't register at all unless I put 200 pounds of pressure on it. A few friends also had some of the same problems with them.
Like Milln said, don't try to learn a new fightpad/controller before learning a stick. It'll only slow you down.