HEXUS Community Review Sept 2018 - Would you like to review a SteelSeries mouse?

[Ice Tea]

@ GoNzO

Very impressed with your honesty about the design flaw as people will often say something is great for no other reason than they got it for free.

[spacein_vader]

Initial impressions of the Sensei 310.

Well it looked very snazzy out of the box:



and upon plugging it in to my surprise Windows recognised all the extra buttons without installing any extra software. That said, for full effect I thought I'd install the Steelseries driver package from their website. This led to a "get off my lawn" moment. 113mb! For a mouse driver! Not only that, as soon as it recognised the rodent in question it insisted on downloading a firmware update for it. I've never had a mouse need a firmware update before!

Once that was done the Steelseries Engine software opened up. This is a combination of a config tool to alter what each button does (useful and well laid out,) as well as a system for downloading "Engine Apps" which allow different software and games to manipulate the throbbing RGB logo and mousewheel. You can have it pulse in time to your music, flash a certain colour when you get a message on Discord, or even go red when you die in Counterstrike. While all this seemed interesting I did what I imagine 90% of people do: Try a couple of them once to see if it works (it does,) then promptly set it back to default and never touched it again.

On to the mouse itself. As others have mentioned the cable is softer and more flexible than any I've previously encountered, which is a good thing for moving the thing around but I worry about how it'll cope with the kids (if I let them near it.) The side grip pads are a different rubbery texture to the smooth plastic of the rest of the mouse which makes it easy to grib and lets you know when you're holding the side of the mouse and not the side mouse buttons. And it's smooth, gliding easily across my desktop with minimal effort.

As for how it performs, wow. I'm having to relearn how to use a mouse. I can't seem to find a DPI figure for my old MS Optical mouse but this is an order of magnitude more sensitive. I spent the first couple of hours overshooting everything I wanted to click on, and I'm still getting the hang of it now. Once I do it'll be interesting to see how I fare in some games with it. I'm also having to learn how to use more than 3 buttons, forcing myself to use the side ones. Once I've had a week or so to do that I'll report back with a more in depth review.

[Zak33]

Initial impressions of the Sensei 310.

Well it looked very snazzy out of the box:



and upon plugging it in to my surprise Windows recognised all the extra buttons without installing any extra software. That said, for full effect I thought I'd install the Steelseries driver package from their website. This led to a "get off my lawn" moment. 113mb! For a mouse driver! Not only that, as soon as it recognised the rodent in question it insisted on downloading a firmware update for it. I've never had a mouse need a firmware update before!

Once that was done the Steelseries Engine software opened up. This is a combination of a config tool to alter what each button does (useful and well laid out,) as well as a system for downloading "Engine Apps" which allow different software and games to manipulate the throbbing RGB logo and mousewheel. You can have it pulse in time to your music, flash a certain colour when you get a message on Discord, or even go red when you die in Counterstrike. While all this seemed interesting I did what I imagine 90% of people do: Try a couple of them once to see if it works (it does,) then promptly set it back to default and never touched it again.

On to the mouse itself. As others have mentioned the cable is softer and more flexible than any I've previously encountered, which is a good thing for moving the thing around but I worry about how it'll cope with the kids (if I let them near it.) The side grip pads are a different rubbery texture to the smooth plastic of the rest of the mouse which makes it easy to grib and lets you know when you're holding the side of the mouse and not the side mouse buttons. And it's smooth, gliding easily across my desktop with minimal effort.

As for how it performs, wow. I'm having to relearn how to use a mouse. I can't seem to find a DPI figure for my old MS Optical mouse but this is an order of magnitude more sensitive. I spent the first couple of hours overshooting everything I wanted to click on, and I'm still getting the hang of it now. Once I do it'll be interesting to see how I fare in some games with it. I'm also having to learn how to use more than 3 buttons, forcing myself to use the side ones. Once I've had a week or so to do that I'll report back with a more in depth review.

welcome to the world of serious mice

its nice to see these initial impressions

[Zak33]

@ GoNzO

Very impressed with your honesty about the design flaw as people will often say something is great for no other reason than they got it for free.

he won't! it's GoNz0!!!!

if he hates it we will get both barrels... that's what reader reviews are for!

but the importance of being ernest is that what he hates somepeople might like so it's good both ways.

[GoNz0]

So it would appear the day I wrote the initial review was an hour before I rolled back my image with macrium wiping out my initial review. Oh well it will give me something to do again

[DanceswithUnix]

I put my review in General Discussion as requested, then wondered if User Reviews would have been more sensible?

link for DanceswithUnix' review

[peterb]

I put my review in General Discussion as requested, then wondered if User Reviews would have been more sensible?

Moved - with a redirect link.

[Zak33]

DancewithUnix and Peterb are right (as usual)

The reviews would be better in the review forum

Link them here when live

[GoNz0]

DancewithUnix and Peterb are right (as usual)

The reviews would be better in the review forum

Link them here when live

Review is up, thanks for the opportunity Hexus

https://forums.hexus.net/general-dis...iew-gonz0.html

[Zak33]

Initial impressions of the Sensei 310.

Well it looked very snazzy out of the box:



and upon plugging it in to my surprise Windows recognised all the extra buttons without installing any extra software. That said, for full effect I thought I'd install the Steelseries driver package from their website. This led to a "get off my lawn" moment. 113mb! For a mouse driver! Not only that, as soon as it recognised the rodent in question it insisted on downloading a firmware update for it. I've never had a mouse need a firmware update before!

Once that was done the Steelseries Engine software opened up. This is a combination of a config tool to alter what each button does (useful and well laid out,) as well as a system for downloading "Engine Apps" which allow different software and games to manipulate the throbbing RGB logo and mousewheel. You can have it pulse in time to your music, flash a certain colour when you get a message on Discord, or even go red when you die in Counterstrike. While all this seemed interesting I did what I imagine 90% of people do: Try a couple of them once to see if it works (it does,) then promptly set it back to default and never touched it again.

On to the mouse itself. As others have mentioned the cable is softer and more flexible than any I've previously encountered, which is a good thing for moving the thing around but I worry about how it'll cope with the kids (if I let them near it.) The side grip pads are a different rubbery texture to the smooth plastic of the rest of the mouse which makes it easy to grib and lets you know when you're holding the side of the mouse and not the side mouse buttons. And it's smooth, gliding easily across my desktop with minimal effort.

As for how it performs, wow. I'm having to relearn how to use a mouse. I can't seem to find a DPI figure for my old MS Optical mouse but this is an order of magnitude more sensitive. I spent the first couple of hours overshooting everything I wanted to click on, and I'm still getting the hang of it now. Once I do it'll be interesting to see how I fare in some games with it. I'm also having to learn how to use more than 3 buttons, forcing myself to use the side ones. Once I've had a week or so to do that I'll report back with a more in depth review.

Elo ello

How are you getting on with your finale piece of review mastery, dear chap?

[spacein_vader]

Final review up here.

[Zak33]

Thanks spacein-vader... a perfectly balanced and well written piece

I enjoyed this process immensely