Introduction

Most of our readers are out for every last little bit of processing power, speed and precision they can get out of their system but what about your mouse and your gaming experience. It's probably the number one thing left out of the equation. I mean you have your box tricked with windows and fans and neons, glowing keyboard, huge monitor, and an overclock high enough to give you a nosebleed but what is stopping you from getting that last kill. It could be something as simple as your mousepad.

Everyone has read other reviews and knows that most reviewers just pit one pad against another or just a desk but we are throwing the whole lot into one big virtual-hideout roundup.

I'm going to take these things through the ringer and do my best to describe the “feel” of each of these pads because no one pad is right for everyone, there is no winner. Some people might like a super slippery surface with little to no resistance. Some might like a little bit of resistance to make those precise movements but not get tired, and some might choose to fight the friction in order to get right to that last pixel to make the head shot.

No one can tell you what you like but I'm up for the challenge of providing you with the product information that no other reviewer has done to date.

So lets start by taking a look at my current setup to give you a better idea of what is going to gauge the tracking performance and smoothness of movement for these beasts.

I'm currently using a Logitech MX500 mouse using the newest Logitech 9.791 drivers. Now these drivers unfortunately have some issues I'd like to address. They have mouse acceleration enabled that you cant disable unless you edit the registry. They also don't run at 800dpi like advertised unless you edit the registry so by following the guide here so we can get you back to the basics. Also another good feature included in the drivers is the ability to change the refresh rate of your mouse to 200hz by using the PS2 adapter and enabling the option in the mouseware software. USB hinders the refresh rate at 125hz which means the sampling rate being sent to your operating system is robbing your game from that mouse input to get you on that last little pixel. You can also do a quick google search for PS2 rate adjuster plus which allows you to do this for any mouse running PS2 in Win9x or Win2K/XP.

I'm going to describe the surfaces based on the resistance while moving the mouse, comfort, pad stability, durability, cleaning, visual aspect, price, and my personal opinion on each pad. I'll try to relay the overall feel of the pad and who might be in the market for that particular pad based on their needs. Let's get started!

Ratings	1	10
Resistance	No resistance at all. Like ice!	Like taking your mouse offroading. Very hard to move but sticks well.
Comfort	So painful you have to be into SM to enjoy it. Very uncomfortable	The lazy boy experience. No annoying things about it.
Pad Stability	Surprised it isn't sliding off my desk on it's own. Just doesn't stay in one place.	Staying put like an anvil. Never going to move on you.
Durability	Probably broken before it's out of the box. Very frail.	Very strong. Should last a long time.
Cleaning	Very difficult to clean. Next to impossible and arm breaking work required.	Very easy to clean. Just breathe on it and wipe it with a paper towel.
Visual Aspect	Looks hideous.	Very sexy. Looks great.

 

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