Mice & Keyboards by stefan @ 2013-04-01
SteelSeries have produced another cool themed product and now we are talking about the Guild Wars 2 gaming mouse. The maximum 5670 CPI value is not stellar, but the tracking is really good on many surfaces we have tried the mouse on. GW2 mouse is also equipped with red LEDs which can be customized from the Engine unified software interface.
At first I would like to thank SteelSeries for offering the Guild Wars 2 Gaming Mouse for testing and reviewing.
"From day one, SteelSeries has been focused on making high performance gaming gear used by the most demanding, top professional gamers worldwide and peripherals that provide superior quality and a competitive edge to gamers of all skill levels. We believe, as most gamers do, in winning, not trying!
What originally began with two people who recognized the need for superior, high-quality/performance gaming gear that would give gamers a competitive edge, has grown into a global leader in gaming and entertainment gear sought after for their high performance capabilities.
Fast-forward to today, and we’ve come a long way since our first glass mousepad. We have global offices in North America, Europe, and Asia, providing an integrated portfolio of products designed specifically for gaming. Fueling our growth is you, the gamer!
While we are proud of our technology and product innovation, we are even more excited about how these products are developed to meet the needs of gamers. Many companies may claim to develop superior gaming products but few actually do. Instead, they spend countless hours with lab engineers trying to force fit a new technology with bells and whistles and mediocre functionality for the end-user.
At SteelSeries, we develop our products with a small internal team and a vast network of technology partners, channel partners, game publishers, and gaming communities around the globe. We aren’t afraid of being challenged and implementing new ideas. Our main goal is to always to listen to the collective feedback of our professional gaming community.
We won’t bore you with cheeky slogans, trying to underline our authenticity as gamers. We fully acknowledge that the best professional gamers in the world know more about what they want and what will make them better, than we do. We are proud to be working with our partners, but we can’t take credit for their invaluable input and feedback. Instead we tell it like it is: they help us. We want to know what works and what doesn’t. For this reason, SteelSeries creates innovative solutions that provide a competitive advantage for all gamers.
Critical to our company’s success is also our reinvestment in the gaming communities and the individuals who support them. As a result, our corporate philosophy is to take a substantial portion of our revenue and put it back into the gaming community to help spur industry growth. We support our community in numerous ways, ranging from co-hosting tournaments like Iron Lady and King of the Hill, and supporting gaming competitions of all sizes, to promoting the top and up-and-coming gaming teams/organizations.
Put simply, SteelSeries does not claim to invent or reinvent the gaming industry. Nor do we focus on one specific product, copy other companies or follow the crowd.
Instead we leave it to you, the gamer, our customer/partner/inspiration, to decide if we are deserving of such declarations and accolades. What we do promise, however, is to remain committed to you. We will continue to work with you and the gaming community to make the best products possible and give you that competitive edge. We will continue to do our best to support the growth of the professional gaming industry and give back to the gaming communities. By doing so, we don’t just talk a good game, we win!"
Weight: 90 grams (0.2 lbs)
Height: 38.7 mm (1.5 in)
Width: 68.3 mm (2.7 in)
Length: 125.5 mm (4.9 in)
Thanks to the support of the SteelSeries Engine software, you can record even extremely long and advanced macros to the Guild Wars 2 Gaming Mouse. The macros can not only be layered and can include keystrokes and precise timing, but they can span across your peripherals allowing you to have a mouse button assigned to perform keyboard strokes and mouse clicks in the same macro. How you will decide to use this advanced feature is up to you (choose your configurations wisely and adhere to any rules that you may need to abide by during gameplay); we are only presenting you with the capabilities for endless possibilities.
Featuring a state of the art laser sensor that offers a consistent and reliable performance, the Guild Wars 2 Gaming Mouse boasts 10.8 megapixel HD image correlation at up to 12,000 frames per second and the ability to handle tracking movements of up to 150 inches per second.
1. Left side button 1
2. Left side button 2
3. Left click
4. Right click
5. Scroll wheel & middle click
6. CPI high / low switch
7. Right side button 1
8. Right side button 2
The red LED illumination is capable of several modes of operation including: solid, slow, medium, and fast pulse. You can also vary the intensity of the illumination between low, medium, and high. For those of you who don’t like glowing shiny stuff on your desktop, you can completely switch off all illumination.
It also brings a very real benefit to users who utilize multiple profiles: by giving them different levels of brightness, you can quickly switch between profiles and also ways know which profile is active.
Material: High performance UPE material covers 16 % of mouse bottom to ensure maximum glide. We recommend changing glides regularly as they will eventually be worn down.
Operating systems:
Windows 2000
Windows XP
Windows Vista
Windows 7
Mac OS X
There’s no need to install software of any kind in order to use the Guild Wars 2 Gaming Mouse. It is completely capable of operating flawlessly with default settings. SteelSeries Engine enhances the Guild Wars 2 Gaming Mouse with advanced customization options like CPI settings, programmable buttons, LED intensity, and lighting modes.
The Guild Wars 2 Mouse is supported by SteelSeries Engine technology.
Frames per second: 12000
Inches per second: 150
Mega pixels per second: 10.8
Counts per inch: 90 – 5670
Maximum acceleration: 30 G
Sensor data path: True 16 bit
Lift distance: ~2 mm
Maximum polling: 1000 Hz
In this review we will look upon another themed mouse from SteelSeries, this time for Guild Wars II. The product comes packed inside a cardboard box with a beautiful artwork, which shows a photo of the mouse in the center:
The front opens like a book only to reveal a product description in multiple languages:
The back side of the mouse comes with the list of product features, written in multiple languages:
SteelSeries Guild Wars II mouse is ambidextrous and comes with a smooth rubberized surface and a color combination between red, white and black; a drawing of an Elder Dragon can be found on its back:
As we have mentioned before, the left and right sides are identical and come with two programmable buttons each, which are made from red plastic (we highly appreciate the use of colored plastic instead of painted plastic, paint which usually gets scratched easily or starts to peel off after some months of heavy usage):
Along with the left and right buttons, we can find a red scroll wheel and a DPI selector button; depending on the DPI mode we are in, the central LED will be on or off:
The red, semi-transparent red plastic bottom of the mouse reminds us of the IntelliMouse Explorer 3.0 and in the center we have the sensor supporting CPI from 90 to 5670. The laterals feature high performance UPE material feet for easy gliding:
The mouse comes with an anti-tangle red cord:
The USB connector is also themed:
In a separate plastic bag we will find a product catalog, one quick start guide and the usual SteelSeries sticker:
The product catalog shows us the other products that SteelSeries is selling:
The mouse installation is pretty straight-forward but SteelSeries describes it anyway in a separate document:
When the mouse is not operating, the back logo is not very visible but when we connect it to a spare USB port, a beautiful red Guild Wars 2 logo will light up:
The scroll wheel also lights up with the help of a red LED:
On the SteelSeries website, we will find not only the Engine unified utility, but also a Firmware Update Tool:
The Firmware Update tool is available for multiple devices; we’ll have to find the “Update Guild Wars 2 Mouse” one though and click on it:
A message will appear on screen just before the flash operation:
As we have seen with the other mice and devices, the SteelSeries Engine is themed and designed specifically for the type of product that is connected; on the left side we will be able to select or define new profiles, the center section takes care of the main mouse functionalities and on the right we will find some more pre-defined functions:
For each mouse button we can program a different function:
These functions can be Keypress Macros, Text Macros, an application launcher or the key can be disabled at will:
Next, we have the Settings screen, where we can define the two DPI steps which will be accessed by the top button, near the scroll wheel; also, we can adjust the polling rate and Ilumination settings:
The Properties button will let us name the current profile and assign a specific application to it if it is needed:
When the Statistics feature is on, we will find out which buttons were used the most:
Thanks to the common and comfortable mouse shape, the Guild Wars 2 mouse from SteelSeries is easy to get used to. SteelSeries Engine will recognize the mouse right away and we can start defining custom functions and also modify the LED lighting effects. The sensor does not have stellar CPI as on other mice we have reviewed in the past, but it tracked really well on the cloth and aluminum pads that we have used in out tests.
The mouse comes with a great looking artwork inspired from the game with the same name and the coating is rubberized. In the white coating areas, we are a bit afraid that after some time the top will get dirty and it would be quite difficult to clean the specific surfaces up.
Unlike other high-end mice on the market the cable is not braided, but it comes in a red color, in order to blend-in with the rest of the design.
Besides the mouse, from SteelSeries we will be also able to find the GW2 headset and pads to add to our collection.
The SteelSeries Guild Wars 2 mouse can be found online for about 55 Euros.
I would like to thank again to SteelSeries for making this review possible!