Mario 64 control issue

While playing Mario 64 I seem to be getting a lot of "drift" with the view/perspective angle. Oftentimes when platform jumping I'll end up with a sideways view of Mario and it can be hard to control him accurately. I realize that this issue is more or less part of the game but when playing the game on the N64 the perspective angle kinda seems to have a little more traction. It's also more prone to drift back to a behind-Mario perspective whereas when playing it on the emulator the perspective seems to stay at weird angles a bit more after drifting off.

My question is, is there an optimum control configuration ideal for Mario 64 to minimize this problem? I'm currently using a somewhat dated pc game controller (Gravis Eliminator Aftershock with most current drivers) but it seems to work fine with several other 3D console/emulation games, like Zelda and DK64. As for the controller plugin, I'm using Jabo's DirectInput7 1.6 along with WinXP and DirectX 9.0c.

Thanks in advance.

You may be correct. Can you let me know what controller plugin and config you used, as well as maybe which pc controller?
Something about playing the game on the emu seems a little off with the controls but I suspect that the problem is on my end and not the emu's.
In the meantime I'm gonna try the N-rage plugin and see if I can't figure out what the 'Real N64 Range' & 'Modifiers' are and if those features will make a difference in playability with the game.