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Xbox 360 Controller for Windows

Milkrosoft

Milkrosoft

New member
I just bought an Xbox 360 controller expecting it to be perfect for PC gaming and emulation. I was quite wrong. The drivers provided by Microsoft are terrible. The L and R triggers are set to the negative and positive values of the same axis, meaning that when both are pressed at the same time, the axis is set to neutral and neither button is recognized as being pressed. The rumble feature does not work. The center button does not light up to represent the current controller. Does Microsoft have any plans on updating the drivers to fix these problems? I am pretty sure that it is possible to fix them because i found this:

http://www.filerush.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=4533&highlight=
When using anything that takes advantage of XInput for controllers, the LEDs around the guide button will indicate which player you are: Top left for 1st player, etc. just like the Xbox 360 would show them. Also, to my knowlege, using XInput is the only way to currently use the rumble features. I have played around with some code that involves the controllers, and it seems to be quite simple to program for them.

Something else to take note of: the plug on the bottom of the controller can be used for a headset. When you plug in a headset, windows sees this as a USB device. Another nifty thing about using XInput, is that when players using Xbox 360 controllers use headsets, you can send and retrieve sound to each individual player. This means that each player may not be hearing the same thing as other players hear, which could prove useful in games.

The latest DirectX SDK has sample code that shows you these different features, as well as how they can be programmed:
DirectX 9.0 SDK Update - (October 2005)

This includes a program that will let you use your analog triggers to alter the speed of each vibration motor individually, as well as a program that will simply echo what a player says into his microphone right back to him, and only him. As I said, the LED around the guide button will be enabled in these, and there are also a few other programs that use XInput as well.
Click to expand...
 
R

ray16

The Grand Potatomaster
The X360 controller is a waste of money until MS releases some prfile software for it, which is why I waited for a few reviews before I just went out and bought one. Games won't take full advantage of the controller unless they are patched to fully support the new XInput API that MS built the controller on, so don't bother trying to use it until some newer games come out (ideally X360 ports).

I'll be sticking with my Xbox controller and XBCD for now, hopefully MS will get its crap straight soon, though. I sure do like the new white/black button placement.
 
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