Ten... gaming mice
The big cheese
Product round-up The three qualities I look for in a gaming mouse are: comfort, aesthetics and accuracy. And considering the imminent financial meltdown of the entire world, I'd like to think that I can get these three qualities for less than a week's shopping at Sainsbury's.
Compared to last year prices, what's on offer seems to be slightly more realistic but splashing out on the wrong mouse could be a costly mistake and I'm not just talking carpal tunnel problems. This being a round-up I've tried to stick to any improvements from previous models reviewed and to pinpoint unique qualities and relative advantages. For testing these products were used in game with World of Warcraft, Left 4 Dead 2 and the current demo of the hotly anticipated Mass Effect 3.
Corsair Vengeance M60 laser gaming mouse
Corsair is usually all about chips – RAM and SSDs – and so I was surprised to discover it has also has a range of peripherals. Marketed for FPS – as opposed to the M90 which is for MMOs – the M60 has a dedicated sniper button with its own dedicated DPI adjustments. This was a good idea in theory but hard to get used to in game. Not the most comfortable mouse out there either because of the side button placement.
It took me a few hours to get used to but once it had settled in there was no lag or skipping even at 5700 DPI and it was consistent on my cloth and plastic surfaces and extremely accurate. Unfortunately, the set-up software is particularly grey and unattractive compared to some of the eye candy offered by other manufacturers. Still, the M60 and M90 are Corsair's first foray into gaming mice and they are definitely on the right track.
Reg Rating 75%
Price £60
More info Corsair
Corsair Vengeance M90 laser gaming mouse
With looks like Sauron's chest plate, this unusual combination of metal and plastic left me impressed by its sturdy build quality, especially the heavy duty metal scroll wheel. With an impressive 15 buttons – nine for macros – and a 5700 DPI sensor, with a few tweeks this could be a great MMO mouse. However, I found the thumbs buttons needed getting used to and were quite hard to differentiate between in the heat of a raid.
Still, the new beta 2.12 software released in January for the M90 seems to have cleared some outstanding issues. I think as Corsair's range develops, it will give the Razer Naga Hex a run for its money, as my MMO mouse of choice. And really, Corsair needs to break out the airbrush to give this mouse some real character, I can think of the perfect logo and it watches over Mordor.
Reg Rating 80%
Price £60
More info Corsair
COMMENTS
Think of the lefties!
So, any recommendations for a semi-decent FPS mouse for us deviant lefties? I physically can't use alot of the mice you feature here!
Re: Is it me......
If I got a girlfriend, my wife would divorce me, and then I wouldn't see my son as much and my business would suffer.
But why
Are most of them so fugly and un-ergonomic? Swear I have RSI just from looking at them.
Am I the only one who appreciates function over pointless styling?
Honestly it looks like decided that the rodents only function was to match an Alienware box or laptop.
Two things:
First, why doesn't anybody talk about latency? There's an obsessive focus on accuracy (which is #2) but no mention of click-to-fire time, where an extra millisecond or so can make a huge difference. In the world of PC game controllers, FFB steering wheels come in with horrid results, often having 300, 400ms of lag (my company having built our own, I'm not sure how they manage it really, but I'm still not entirely happy with the performance of ours).
Second, 6400dpi?! What the? If you've got your mouse set to do a slow 360 degree rotation in, say, 3" (it's been a while since I've played an FPS, but that seems about right from feel), you'd have, what, 50 counts per degree? With a horizontal FOV of 120 degrees you'd be looking at 6000 counts left-to-right onscreen.
Is there anybody who's positioning himself within 1/3rd of a pixel (on a 19x10 screen)? Is there any game that would understand that? I mean, maybe now games are doing subpixel rotations and there are supreme badasses out there who can discern that enough to be useful. But it seems like they'd be few and far between.
Even without all of that, I defy anybody to say they can position that fucker within 1/6400th of an inch, with their hand. The stickslip from the mouse to the pad will defy that, no matter what kind of space-age material your mouse pad is made of. And 1/6400th of an inch is a very, very, VERY small amount. I build motion platforms and the requisite servo systems, and am broadly familiar with CNC machining gear, and half a thousandth is getting pretty fine. Thinking your hand is going to reliably, and with any meaningful result, match that performance while holding onto a little brick sitting on a piece of fabric / plastic, when what you're seeing is delayed by several milliseconds *anyway*...
If you ask me, you'd be better off getting a CRT projector or a CRT monitor, which will lop at a minimum several ms off your visual latency. It's bad enough with even a fast LCD monitor (gray-to-gray is pointless; I'm talking *latency*), but with a TV you can usually go get a cup of coffee between the arrival of a bit at the HDMI port and its eventual display on the screen. The Sonys we use are, at 720p in 3D mode, with 'gaming' on, barely, barely acceptable for driving sims. For FPSes it'd be utterly hopeless.
So, on the assumption that (shudder) I'm wrong - what is there to justify that number, aside from marketing? Is effective resolution really 1/5th of that number due to noise or jitter, or due to inaccuracies in manufacturing the hardware?
Also, what the hell is up with that Mad Catz Cyborg monstrosity? Even if it was the best mouse in the world, I'd keep it in my drawer when I wasn't using it in case someone saw it. It's like they took a graphite shell shaped like a mouse, filled it orange jell-o, and hit it with a hammer until the marketing guys said to stop. Eruughh.
