xbox 360 wireless controller and vista

I'm hoping someone can help me out! i have my 360 controller installed on my
vista premium laptop however am finding it hard to get it to work on any
games.

I dont usually bother with controllers tbh, the last controller i had (a few
years ago) came with a program that allowed me to set the buttons on my
controller to keyboard commands/keys ie if i pressed forward on my d-pad it
would send the keypress "W" to the game? kind of?

anyway does anyone know of a program that allows me to do this with the ms
contoller or controllers in general?

appreciate any replies!