Well, provided that you find the 360 controller's d-pad acceptable, the wired xbox 360 controller works directly, however the wireless 360 controller does not work directly, a different wireless controller that specifies working with the PC has to be purchased and uses a specialized receiver as well. However, once that is accomplished it works well. I do find it obnoxious that it both requires an external USB receiver and the typical wireless 360 controller does not work with the PC. Still, that is the one I use, and it works well.
Are you talking about the ones advertises for PC or the ones not sold for PC? When I bought mine (circa 2010) I had to purchase one advertises for PC as the one I had for the 360 before would not work with it otherwise. It seemed nonsensical to me that such was the case.
From the page. "Xbox 360 Controller for Windows works with most Windows XP-based PCs and Xbox 360, delivering a consistent and universal gaming experience."
It comes with a wireless dongle thing you plug in to your PC. Both the controllers that come with your 360 and this controller can be swapped between your PC and your 360 on demand by pushing the resync button on the controller and on the device simultaneously.
I've never heard of a 360 controller that didn't work both with the PC dongle and the 360 itself.
(replying to the child post) The products are not the same if for no other reason than because one comes with the receiver and ordering the other product does not, and that the receiver is even required is not something that is apparent beforehand without research, so the buyer must understand that having the product work as expected will require purchasing either the receiver as a stand alone product or as the bundle which is distinguished by being labeled as "...for Windows."
Naively, I had expected beforehand that the controller to use 802.11(a|b|g|n|ac) or bluetooth and therefore not need another receiver provided that those protocols were already available on the PC, but in the case of the wireless Xbox 360 controller another component is necessary for better or worse.
Luckily, I researched the situation before purchasing another controller with its usage on the PC in mind, so I did not encounter a potential headache until the solution dawned upon me.
Hopefully the next generation PS4 or Xbox One wireless controllers work without taking up a port on the PC with a wireless receiver again.
There actually exists two separate Microsoft Wireless 360 controllers, the one that specifies for Windows will work on both the PC and for the Xbox 360 (after syncing the controller with the appropriate receiver, something which is somewhat tricky if the PC receiver and the console receiver are within the controller's wireless range).
However, the one which does not specify "...for Windows" will not work with the PC, which is the distinction I am attempting to express when recommending it as an option for PC gaming.
The "For windows" version is simply bundled with the wireless receiver. Once you have one of those, you can use any 360 controller.
I regularly use both the controller that came with my 360, and another 360 controller that I brought separately (with no "for windows" marking) in addition the controller that came with the wireless receiver.
