EPT1. Have questions about the legitimacy of gaming mice
2. Bought a gaming mouse and want to know what it is you actually got
3. Are considering buying a gaming mouse but aren't sure what to look for
4. Want to know more about gaming mice in general
then this post is for you. The world of gaming mice is filled with misinformation, misunderstanding, zealotry, and regret. I made this in order to give practical, helpful information to try to do away with some of that pain.
+ Show Spoiler [Part 1: What?] +
What is a gaming mouse? Unfortunately, it's a worthless phrase that has been transformed into mega-dollars by people more clever and devious than you. Well, that about wraps up part 1.
Thankfully, I'm only mostly joking.
A long time ago there was an awesome set of games that go by the name Quake. Specifically, my poison was Quake III Arena. I played this game feverishly and built up a very high skill in it over time. I remember that I was using this old IBM mouse at the time (it's old now, anyway). I don't admit to knowing much about general gaming history or progaming history, but Quake III Arena was my first experience in the world of progaming. It was where I first learned the term and where I first realized the long-term consequences of such an idea existing.
For anyone that has played the Quake games, you will probably know of a concept called bunny hopping. This is a bug in the acceleration mechanics in the game. In FPS games, when you jump around you experience acceleration. Acceleration is a very well-established concept in physics that is completely separate from velocity. Velocity is a rate of 'gaining' motion. It's like the miles per hour or kilometers per hour meter in a vehicle. If you are going 60 miles per hour, that means after 30 minutes, you will have gone 30 miles. But acceleration is a rate of 'gaining' (or losing) velocity. When the needle moves up the track or down the track, it is because of acceleration (positive or negative depending on direction).
When jumping in modern FPS games, you gain an acceleration in whatever direction you jumped, but your speed is then RESET once you touch the ground. There is a bug in the Quake engine which allows you to STOP this reset using a certain set of motions while jumping. In this way, your avatar can reach an incredibly high velocity by maintaining this acceleration. The faster speed makes you slightly harder to hit and, more importantly, gives you incredible mobility when compared to someone that does not use the bug. Also jumping around, makes it hard for people to predict your motion - the human brain is less used to acceleration and more used to velocity.
Many, many people considered bunny hopping cheating. It was a glitch in the game engine. It was completely unintentional on the developers' part. Why wasn't it patched? Why are people that use this exploit not banned? The fact is that bunny hopping became the glitch that defined the entire game. To play at a high skill level, you had to be an EXPERT at bunny hopping. The analogy is similar to muta stacking.
So at this point in my life, I learned a few valuable lessons. The main one being that the score at the end of the game determines the winner. In-between things like exploits and whatnot don't matter. If you can do it in the game, it's a valid strategy. If using an exploit makes you win, and your goal is to win, it would be completely illogical to not use the exploit. I learned this attitude from players that were better than me. The attitude of 'fair fighting' was holding me back. I didn't even understand at the time what 'winning' meant. But now it's so simple - it's being the victor at the end of the game. Using some ruleset that is not in the game is not trying to win - it is like playing another game altogether.
It really is that starkly different. It's like if two chess champions had a match and one brought his tennis racket and demanded to serve first. It's completely RIDICULOUS.
Winning is not a moralistic concept. It's so much simpler than that. The team with the highest score at the end wins the game. So simple, but I ignored that for so long.
This is the point where I learned about gaining advantages. It's easier to win if you have an advantage over your opponents. There's no medal for the team that wins while playing with handicaps(!!!) so gain as many advantages as you can and make it as easy for yourself as you can.
This is where gaming mice come in! Yeah that's right, the topic of this post is gaming mice, remember? Back in that day, I don't really remember the concept of gaming mice. People bought mice that were comfortable and used them. They used mice they were familiar with.
But this guy I played with all the time taught me a really cool secret. He broke open his mouse and noticed there was lots of free space inside. What he did was put little fishing weights inside the mouse to make it more stable. This has the effect of giving the mouse more momentum and a better weight distribution (if you put the right weights in the right place). It required more force to move and less force to stop (because of the added friction) - in other words, it took less effort overall to make a correction. At the time, this was a pretty huge advantage in a game like Q3A. So I did a similar thing to my mouse, and, by god, it was EASIER to win. I had gained an advantage.
Fast forward a couple of years and we have the concept of gaming mice becoming pretty popular (from my memory). I read about them on websites I visited, I saw them at tech stores, people talked about them. I thought the idea was SILLY. I thought, cynically, it was just another move to get more cash out of a bunch of stupid cows with too much money.
Fast forward another couple of years, and I won't use anything but what I consider to be 'gaming mice'. Looking back at my previous cynical feelings is pretty humorous considering that I MODDED my non-gaming mouse to give me an advantage. I guess I thought no one else was clever enough to do such a thing, especially not big companies.
This first part is really aimed at those who are skeptical of the idea of gaming mice (I know lots of people still are). Unfortunately, my cynicism turned out to be partially right, and there are lots of bullshitters out there who will take your money and give you a sub-par product. But if you are playing competitive games or even just browsing TL, you are much better off with a gaming mouse.
Not having a gaming mouse is like using a weapon in an FPS that's innacurate, does less damage, and reloads slower. Gaming mice are just better in every way. The better a mouse is, the more natural it feels, the less you have to think about it.
The mouse is the single most important piece of equipment you have in games (a good keyboard is right up there behind it - but what constitutes a good keyboard is less objective, so I'll stay away from that mostly). It's more important than the video card or processor? Yup. For me, I realize that the mouse IS THE GAME. It is the interface. Playing with a bad mouse is like typing with mittens on. A good mouse is good because it lowers the bar of difficulty in the interface - it puts you more directly in contact with the game. The perfect mouse is telepathy, but we are not there yet.
In summary: gaming mice are the real deal. If you are good at a game, they will make you better! A good gaming mouse is not an instant skill-hike. It will simply enable you to bring out your best game.
+ Show Spoiler [Part 2: What makes a gaming mouse?] +
A good advertising campaign and really bright LEDs.
Just kidding.
There is a lot of confusion about technical specifications of mice. This confusion takes many forms. Some are simply confused about what the technical specifications actually mean. Others are not but are confused about their effect. Still others are confused about the entire concept. I have, in the past, shared every one of these confusions about pretty much every aspect of a mouse.
If you are looking into buying a good mouse, what do you look for? Some people will tell you to get the most expensive mice because they are simply better, have more advanced engines and technology in general etc. Others will tell you to buy the cheapest mouse you can and just adjust the speed slider in the control panel until it feels right. Others will swear by a particular mouse or a particular brand of mouse. Others will tell you to buy whatever suits you. This last one is the most correct and unfortunately least helpful out of all the advice that is given.
I have put together a set of criteria that anyone should look for in a good gaming mouse. This will be more helpful to those who have previously owned a high-quality mouse and are familiar in an intimate sense with what I am speaking of, but I will also do my absolute best to demistify some of the terms you often hear with mice.
My main goal in this guide is getting results. I am currently a student of physics, and I understand the value of hard numbers. However, things that are theoretically superior are often practically inferior because of complex circumstances. This is occasionally the case with mice as well - so all of my advice is geared towards results and not necessarily technical superiority, though the two are often indistinguishable. I will not take two mice, make a table with their technical specifications and declare a victor.
I've listed the criteria below somewhat in order of importance, though many are directly related. My ordering of these criteria is almost purely subjective, but my evaluation of each one is as objective as possible.
+ Show Spoiler [Comfort] +
The first and most important requirement is comfort. The mouse has to be comfortable. It must conform to your hand. If you experience pain, tension, or discomfort of any kind, it will distract you from playing the game properly (and it could also lead to long-term injury!). The proper way to hold 99% of mice is to have your forearm parallel with the ground and your wrist as straight as possible. In this position, the mouse must be comfortable or it will lead to muscle aches and other things which will make your play much worse over time.
These days, gaming mice win in comfort by having ergonomic shaping. This is basically chopping away bits of volume of a 'solid' mouse so that the fingers and thumb (and possibly palm) fit more comfortably and more exactly in a certain place. The placement of these finger and thumb niches also determines the distribution of your fingers' muscle power. For example, most right handed gaming mice have it set up so that your right hand is tilted very slightly to the right and the mouse is easily maneuverable by using only your Ring finger and your Thumb. The weight of the mouse is distributed such that the center of mass is very close to the line between your Thumb and Ring finger (an imaginary line connecting the two tips). This makes it so that you use less energy and use that energy more efficiently when moving the mouse around.
Comfort is not a concept of the stationary when it comes to mice. You can make a mouse that's basically a hand pillow, but when you have to move it around the pad, it will be VERY uncomfortable. A mouse must be comfortable when moving or still. This is where grip comes into play. If the mouse is well-designed it will give you a powerful grip so that it's easy to control the weight and motion of the mouse.
+ Show Spoiler [Tracking] +
The next most important concept is tracking. Mouse tracking is actually an extremely complicated and heavily mathematical subject when it comes down to it. Calculus and numerical analysis are key to understanding what makes a mouse track. But for gaming purposes, all we need to know is whether the mouse tracks well. Keep in mind that tracking well is equivalent to the mouse doing what you think it should do when you tell it to do something.
Most mice do pretty well these days. The software that analyzes tracking data is well-understood and is sometimes taught at the undergraduate level depending on the style of classes you are taking. However, as with any process involving algorithms, the more time spent studying a problem, the better the results are. Also, the more single-purpose your problem is, the more refined your algorithm can be.
Mouse tracking can probably be improved 'infinitely' given enough time and money. This means a designer can throw as much money as he has at just mouse tracking. So when do you stop? Do you stop when you get less improvement for more work? Do you stop at a budget line? This is a tough question to answer. What a good designer will do is have goals in mind for mouse tracking and will meet those goals barring impossible/improbable barriers. This is why gaming mice have an edge in mouse tracking. Designers for these mice place the bars as high as they can without getting fired or sent to a mental hospital. Designers for a 10 dollar mouse probably won't put as much effort into it.
+ Show Spoiler [DPI and Polling Rate] +
Two important parts of mouse tracking are DPI (or more properly CPI) and polling rate. DPI is enough of an issue to gain its own special place in the history of internet flame wars. Just search TL for DPI and see how much sarcasm, rage, and misinformation you can find. And then imagine some place with a lower concentration of civility.
+ Show Spoiler [DPI] +
Flame on. The things I say here will be controversial - but not because they are wrong. DPI is a hot topic with gaming mice and many people believe that companies that push high-DPI products (Razer and Logitech) are just trying to swindle honest gamers. For those of you that don't like to read or can't resist a good ol' tldr, higher DPI is generally better - yes, I said it.
DPI is such a terrible term in the mouse world that I will instead opt to call it CPI from now on in order not to burst quite so many blood vessels. I used to hate on DPI hype just as much as anyone else, and I too produced buckets of foam over the subject - so I understand.
So just what is CPI? A lot of people commit semantic seppuku and call it 'sensitivity' - hell, even some companies often call it sensitivity or say that it's for 'high-sensitivity' gamers. Well, this is a meaningless phrase to me. What does sensitivity mean? If I look that up in a dictionary, I just get confused by talking about mice using the term. I'm going to establish a working set of definitions so that I can speak practically about what it does with no room for confusion.
Velocity is the physical speed at which your mouse or mouse cursor is moving (I am making my own definitions here in order to be as clear as possible). If your mouse cursor moves 1 foot in 1 second, it's velocity is 1 foot per second.
Speed is in reference to the 'speed' sliders in the OS and in the mouse driver options. So if I say a speed of 0, I mean the speed slider is set to its lowest (usually leftmost) value.
Consider a mouse set up so that the cursor moves at a velocity of 'x' (assuming the hand can move the mouse at this constant speed). If the CPI in this setup is doubled, the mouse cursor will now move at '2x', so twice the velocity. Double the CPI, double the velocity. Most people understand this much.
But the question is: what do you lose or gain by doubling the CPI? When you double the CPI, you double the number of points taken to make up the mouse path. What does that mean? Any mouse path is not a continuous line, it is a number of points. Mouse motion appears to be continuous because the individual points taken are very close together. So if the mouse plots out 100 points to move one millimeter on the screen, the screen will have drawn the mouse 100 times during that motion (this isn't entirely accurate, but I'm trying to get the idea across). It is unlikely that most people will notice it anything other than as a smooth motion (sort of like how animations are made of discrete frames but can appear smooth).
Since it doubles the number of points, why does it double the velocity of the cursor? Remember, that your hand moves at a constant speed (this it to make it simpler). If your hand moves to the right some distance, let's say the mouse cursor moves a distance 'x'. If you double the CPI and try it again, your hand still moves at the same speed but the mouse cursor moves a distance of '2x'. In the first instance, let's say your mouse took 100 points to make the motion. So in the second instance, it took 200 points to make the motion. The points were not spaced closer together, they were spaced the same distance as before - CPI does not affect the point spacing. So what happened was, you have the same point spacing and twice as many points - your cursor will have to move double distance, and to do that in the same time period, you will have to move twice the speed.
So CPI does not affect the smoothness of the mouse motion. If you cut the point distance in half, I would simply define the new mouse path to be twice as smooth. Good mouse tracking is all about smoothness. The smoother the tracking is, the more natural it feels. If the CPI does not affect this, who cares? I'll get back to this point after I talk about
Speed sliders. The speed sliders in your OS and driver software are what affect the point spacing. So if you want maximum smoothness, you should cut these sliders all the way down - that way the points will be very tightly spaced. But wait, there's a problem. This makes the mouse cursor extremely slow. So what do we do to solve this problem? Raise the CPI.
It is the combination of lowering the point spacing and raising the number of points that allows for the maximum smoothness at a comfortable cursor speed. The higher your maximum CPI, the lower you can set the speed sliders. So my suggestion is to set your CPI to the absolute maximum and then lower the speed sliders in your OS and mouse drivers to find a comfortable speed.
People that get high DPI mice and crank the DPI to the max and set the speed sliders to full will quickly discover that it's impossible to maneuver their mice. This could be the reason many people frown on high-DPI, thinking it's all about increasing the speed at which your cursor can move. This is not it at all. High DPI just allows you to lower the 'speed' cursors in your OS and drivers so that you have a smoother tracking at the same cursor speed - this means higher DPI is strictly superior.
+ Show Spoiler [More on Speed Sliders] +
I have read in many places that there is a 'default' position for speed sliders which is optimal. It is said that positions in front of or behind this default position add interpolation to the mouse. Now, whether or not you are on default positions, interpolation is going on - this is just how mouse tracking works. What matters is whether having minimal interpolation is best for smooth mouse tracking. As an extra small note, it can be demonstrated that the highest speed settings in Windows XP cause the mouse to skip pixels. This is bad. Avoid the highest settings.
I did a few experiments to test out the difference between this default setting and other settings. Throughout every experiment, I tried to keep the mouse cursor at a speed that I was most familiar with. This is the fixed variable in the experiment. Unfortunately, the other variables have to be tweaked around this variable so I can't do tests on every extrema.
In the GIMP 2.6, I used a custom 3x3 'cross' pattern (like a D-pad on a SNES controller, basically) to draw an unfinished 'infinity' character. I used the paint brush tool instead of the pencil tool. The character drawn is unfinished in order that the start and end points can be clearly seen (started at top right, ended at bottom left). The mouse used is the Logitech G5 with all weights removed and the weight chamber removed. The results are as follows:
+ Show Spoiler [LOW CPI] +
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![[image loading]](http://i952.photobucket.com/albums/ae1/mettra/w_10_sp_5_dpi_400.png)
1. W 10, SP 5, CPI 400 (Windows Speed 10, Setpoint Speed 5)
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![[image loading]](http://i952.photobucket.com/albums/ae1/mettra/w_8_sp_5_dpi_400.png)
2. W 8, SP 5, CPI 400
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![[image loading]](http://i952.photobucket.com/albums/ae1/mettra/w_5_sp_10_dpi_400.png)
3. W 5, SP 10, CPI 400
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In this case, the clear winner is (2). These results seem to suggest staying away from maximum speed values. Neither the Setpoint nor the Windows speed slider seems to be better when maxed. Pixel skipping is clearly present in both max settings while the same cannot be said of the 'middle' setting.
+ Show Spoiler [MEDIUM CPI] +
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![[image loading]](http://i952.photobucket.com/albums/ae1/mettra/w_10_sp_0_dpi_1300.png)
4. W 10, SP 0, CPI 1300
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![[image loading]](http://i952.photobucket.com/albums/ae1/mettra/w_5_sp_5_dpi_1450.png)
5. W 5, SP 5, CPI 1450 (defaults)
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(4) is actually worse than some of the low-CPI results. This seems to indicate that it's better to have the Setpoint speed high than the Windows speed high. The 5/5 setting is the testing of the 'default' settings that supposedly minimize bad interpolation. It is actually one of the best results by far. I would rate it second best overall.
+ Show Spoiler [HIGH CPI] +
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![[image loading]](http://i952.photobucket.com/albums/ae1/mettra/w_2_sp_8_dpi_2000.png)
6. W 2, SP 8, CPI 2000
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![[image loading]](http://i952.photobucket.com/albums/ae1/mettra/w_8_sp_1_dpi_2000.png)
7. W 8, SP 1, CPI 2000
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Yet further indication that the Windows speed bar is inferior to the Setpoint speed bar. I would rate (6) as the best result so far, but it is very close to (5).
+ Show Spoiler [Summary] +
Generally speaking: higher CPI is better, Windows' speed slider is worse than the Setpoint speed slider (in terms of smoothness), using maximum speed slider settings is bad in either case.
In terms of the 'default' phenomenon, there seems to be some merit to it. I took the default setting and the setting that I rated the best and played a game of Starcraft with both. The setting I rated best won because it felt better than the other setting. Going by the comparison of the drawings only, it could go either way. I don't plan on doing any further experiments with the default setting, but I have hopefully provided a pretty good method for someone else to do their own testing.
For the setting that I rated best, you can see that there is obviously spots that lack smoothness. There are two explanations for these spots. First, I was intentionally not trying my best to make it as good as possible. I drew the top left figure first, a little bit slowly. Then the right figure, a little bit quickly. Then the bottom figure at the most comfortable pace. Obviously, in my mouse setup I am sacrificing a bit of control for more speed. This is a subjective thing. All gamers have to sacrifice one to get more of the other to find their optimal settings. This will become less and less true in the future as DPI becomes higher and mouse engines become better.
+ Show Spoiler [Post-Discussion DPI Findings] +
There was a bit of discussion in the thread about the relationship between DPI and speed sliders. After a great deal of reading and more research into the problem, things start to become more clear. I have left the rest of my post unedited for content (only edited for grammar fixes etc.) just to keep things in perspective.
My earlier findings came down to this: Higher CPI is always better, turn down the Windows speed slider to adjust for speed. There are a few problems with this finding that are more apparent after a lot of thought and further reading.
1. Driver-specific interference: The mouse used was a Logitech G5 using Setpoint drivers. In my 'best' settings, I had maximum DPI on the mouse and Windows Speed slider on 2/10, but I also had Setpoint Speed slider on 8/10. The reason I arrived at this setup in the first place was that I noticed how terrible the Windows slider reacted at very high settings - my conclusion was that having Setpoint Speed high was better than having Windows speed high.
2. I did the experiment without actual specific knowledge of how the Windows speed slider worked and how DPI worked with it. The ideas I presented about point spacing and so on were correct but incomplete in an important way - this idea was merely from my experience of using mice with different DPI and meddling with Speed sliders.
3. Mouse-specific: The G5 is only one mouse. In order for something to be more demonstrative, it has to apply to any mouse in every situation at every setting. I only did the experiment based on the cursor speed - whichever cursor speed felt right was tested. More thorough results at different cursor speeds could be more exact.
4. External factors: This includes my habits with the G5, the way I maneuver it, my grip positions, my choice of mousepad etc.
Before I address all these points more fully, I'd like to say this: for the G5, I still prefer the W2/SP8/2000 setting over any other setting. It just feels better in Starcraft. I can select groups of units or individual units more easily. There may be some psychology at work, but I do consistently better with that setting. I have some ideas about why it could be that way, but I first need to explain some of the background information.
+ Show Spoiler [Windows Speed Slider] +
Windows Speed Slider Tests
Windows at 5/10 (6/11) is a 1:1 transformation from counts generated on your mouse to points generated on the monitor. This means that if you have a monitor 1200 pixels wide and 1200 CPI and W5, then you can move from one extreme of the monitor to the other in one inch of sensor motion. Note that for this to happen, no pixels can be skipped - motion is not added to or subtracted from.
Windows at 3/10 is a 2:1 counts to points transformation. This means that if you have a monitor 1200 pixels wide with 1200 and W3, it will take 2 inches of sensor motion to move across the screen. Notice what happens to the 'extra' counts, though. They are basically dropped.
The point spacing idea I presented earlier is still happening, it is just incomplete. At W3, if you generate two points 'moving across' the same pixel, one of them is dropped by the OS. This is basically a rounding thing. If the one point wasn't enough to get 'across' to the next pixel, then it is simply registered a movement in a subpixel and no cursor motion happens until you get enough counts to successfully cross the pixel.
So using these ideas, a setting of W5 at 'X' CPI should be equivalent to a setting of W3 at '2X' CPI. There are similar multipliers for the other settings (see the above link).
The final conclusion then is this: having a CPI higher than what is comfortable at W5 is pointless. If you use higher CPI and lower the Windows speed slider, it is equivalent to lowering the DPI in your mouse.
If all we take into account are CPI and Windows speed sliders, this is a correct view. However, there are other factors which could affect the interaction of these two.
I could not find any solid information on the Setpoint speed slider. If anyone has a technical 'manual' explaining its functions, please post them in the thread - I could not find any on their website. I also could not find any results of people experimenting with different Setpoint Speed slider settings. It is easy enough to test the behavior of Setpoint at W5, but at other settings their interaction could be very complicated (I don't have any way of really testing this - if you are cleverer than me, please post your idea).
The author in the link posted under the Windows Speed Slider section claims "With Logitech Setpoint, the mouse shows acceleration even if you increase pointer speed one notch and even have acceleration turned off, including within the driver. I tested this myself." but provides no results (also, the Setpoint version he is using is fairly old). This could be true, but if acceleration exists it is either 1) very slight or 2) somehow minimized by the other settings. I don't have any IRL apparatus to accurately move the mouse an inch at different speeds to test this, and trying to find acceleration by using fast motions yields no obvious results. It could be that the 'acceleration' he's detecting is just an added form of interpolation - the mouse is 'predicting' the path based on previous counts.
Another phenomenon that I can find no solid technical information about is prediction. It could be that W5@X CPI isn't equal to W3@2X CPI because of prediction. Does prediction take into account the subpixel counts? If so, then these 2 settings cannot be equal. If it's taking into account more points, then it will almost certainly behave differently.
In summary: I have no technical explanation for my preference of the W2/SP8 setting. It could be that the interaction of added interpolation, multiplicative scaling, and count-based prediction come together to make a setting that just behaves more like I think it should. I would appreciate further discussion of this issue in the thread.
tldr Experiment with your mouse settings to find what's best for you.
+ Show Spoiler [DPI extras] +
Two real strengths of today's DPI usage are on-the-fly DPI switching and DPI customization. OTF switching just means changing the DPI using a button press (and also it should change quickly or you'll die in the meantime). I haven't personally found this terribly useful, but in e.g. modern FPSs you can switch the DPI down to work with a precision weapon like a sniper rifle or you can switch the DPI up to work with a 'heavy' weapon like a minigun which the designers decided it would be fun to make you turn slowly (this is bad design, it is not a balancing mechanic). For RTS this is basically useless.
DPI customization is all about finding your mouse's sweet spot. Every person is different. Everyone uses their hands differently. You might have two twin brothers where one likes 1200 DPI and the other likes 1250. This kind of customization is incredible because you can really make the mouse work for you. You can find a setting that feels exactly correct.
+ Show Spoiler [Polling Rate] +
Most mice these days have a polling rate in the neighborhood of 125 Hz - an update every 8 ms. However, many gaming mice now have 1000 Hz capability, which is an update every 1 ms. Not only does the mouse respond more quickly to your movement, but you are also improving any interpolation going on (there is always some interpolation going on). If you're aiming at something in an FPS and then decide to suddenly aim at something else, there is a lag between the time that your mouse moves and your cursor moves. If you have a 125 Hz mouse, that lag time is 8 ms (plus whatever other input lag exists). If you have 1000 Hz mouse, that lag time is only 1 ms (plus whatever other input lag exists). Removing 7 ms of lag is a huge deal in such a situation - not to mention the better tracking that comes as a result.
The average male untrained response time is about 200 ms. So a heavily trained response time (e.g. your brain saying "move the cursor over the enemy" in an FPS) could be as low as 50-60 ms, but let's use 100 ms to get a nice even number. The difference between 108 ms and 101 ms is of course 7 ms. There is about a 7% difference between these two numbers. That means that for all the fast actions you take, you become 7% faster. It's like becoming 7% better at the game you are playing. It is basically legalized cheating. Note there are more sources of input lag than just your mouse, though. But decreasing input lag is never bad.
+ Show Spoiler [Friction] +
The next most important facet of your mouse is friction, though this ties in a lot with comfort. When you roll a ball across a smooth floor, the reason it doesn't roll forever (if it doesn't hit a wall, that is) is friction. Molecular-scale collisions at the contact surface cause the ball to lose its rotational energy. This leakage of energy is the important part of friction. Friction is generally seen as making things less efficient than they would otherwise be in its absence.
When you move your mouse across the mouse pad, there is a certain resistance. If this resistance is really high, it takes a lot of work to get the mouse moving and very little to make it stop. Now quick stopping is good, but slow moving is horrendous. Most gaming mice these days use teflon feet on important contact points along the mouse in order to make it as slick as possible. There is such a thing as too slick, but you have to try pretty hard to find it. Some people get an extremely slick setup (teflon feet on the mouse + very slick mousepad) and just use a heavier mouse or use a mouse with a weight system. When in doubt, go for quick mouse movement. Stopping is very important, but moving is usually much more important. I personally use a 'medium' setup with an unextraordinary cloth mousepad.
Non-gaming mice unfortunately often have some kind of slippy plastic or other non-teflon friction system. The problem with these is twofold. There is no replacement for teflon that I am aware of. Teflon has almost all the good qualities and almost none of the bad qualities that you are looking for in a friction solution for mousefeet. The second problem is that slippy plastic becomes much worse over time. Teflon wears down and slowly loses its edge, but slippy plastic often depends highly on a sort of coating on the outer surface of the plastic. After that's gone, it's done.
Having a good friction solution on your mouse gives you two advantages. One is that you can move the mouse more accurately because you can respond more quickly. The second is that you use less energy and less effort.
The other part where friction is very important is in the grip of the mouse. Now a lot of people ignore this aspect of mice at first. They look for an ergonomic handhold, but that just won't do by itself. You have got to have a surface on the top and/or sides of the mouse that allows you a strong hold on the mouse. The specific kind of surface (solid plastic vs. rubberized plastic etc.) is completely subjective. They both work just fine. Some people prefer one, some prefer the other. What matters is that it gives you the strongest hold on the mouse. I'm not talking about furiously clutching the mouse here, I'm saying let the friction do the work for you. If you move your mouse, the friction should hold it tight against your fingers so that it's not slipping around.
One thing to look out for with surfaces is their reaction to water. Some surfaces do not change when they become wet. Some surfaces (hydrophilic) have even better friction when they get wet. Some surfaces become slippery when they are wet. If you are reading this, there's a good chance you are human. Your hands sweat, even if to varying degrees. Your mouse needs to respond well to this. If you go into Best Buy and indiscriminately buy a mouse, it is very likely that you will come home with a mouse that becomes very slippery when your hands sweat. This can be game-breaking. You need to be at 110% when things get hectic and you are under a lot of stress. If instead, your mouse starts becoming slippery, you'll spend your precious time and attention on shifting your fingers around trying to 'find' your grip.
+ Show Spoiler [Click action] +
If you find one of those mice out there with a bad click action, you will pay terribly for it. This part really applies to the RTS gamers out there. How fast can you make individual clicks on your mouse? It ought to be as fast as you can possibly get your finger to action the click. Now do all these clicks register properly? The answer ought to be yes.
Some mice, believe it or not, are extremely limited in their click action. Sometimes, but very rarely, you will find a mouse that takes a long time to click (pushing the mouse button down). This may be because of the design of the mouse or it may be because of something caught in the 'chamber'. It could also be a faulty grip that doesn't give you enough power when your finger is pushing down on the button.
More commonly, mice have a slow release. This is the time that it takes the mouse button to pop back up into position, ready for another click. This is almost as bad as a slow click because it means that your click-to-click speed is slower than it should be.
Another problem that rears its ugly head in many mice is unregistered clicks. On a good gaming mouse, you can wail on button 1 or 2 all day long, and every click will be registered. However, some mice have bad limits on the amount of data they can send to your OS. For example, you could have a mouse with a really high polling rate, but to make room for that, some clicks could be lost in the process.
These problems actually have mostly disappeared, but watch out for long release times.
+ Show Spoiler [Longevity] +
If your mouse is a cheap piece of crap, the laws of physics and principles of engineering suggest that it will wear down quickly. This can be very deceiving. Some cheap mice feel pretty good in the hand, have a good weight distribution, and have a pretty good surface and are overall not bad. However, after a couple of months, the plastic on the surface has been eroded by the corrosive saltwater and the surface now no longer provides the friction it once did.
More commonly, mouse buttons fail. They start to wiggle around on their own and perhaps slowly migrate into a different position. The mouse feet wear down as well. This is probably the most noticeable difference because it happens so quickly.
It's my belief that, excepting horrible luck, if you buy a mouse from a company like Logitech or Razer, it will be built to last - especially the weakest points which tend to be the mouse feet, the surface, and the buttons. Feel free to disagree if you have a story about this one time you bought a mouse from some company and it died the next day. Because, you know, every single mouse that comes out of the factory is like that - otherwise how would they make so much money if people didn't buy the same mouse every day?
+ Show Spoiler [Liftoff] +
Liftoff is a term that deals with what distance the mouse tracks at beyond its sensor. Usually, a short liftoff is best. The idea is that if you lift the mouse up to move it over, the mouse should stop tracking, the instant it loses contact with the surface. However, we're not quite there yet. Most mice have a fairly small liftoff, but if you are a pro FPS player, you want the minimum possible liftoff since you will likely be picking up the mouse and moving it over a few dozen times in a match.
+ Show Spoiler [Part 3: Mouse Performance] +
Performance is everything you want out of a mouse - that's my definition. If there's something about your mouse you dislike, it is not performing for you. Performance can be thought of as the combination of useful characteristics from Part 2 working together to be greater than their individual offerings.
If a mouse has ridiculously awesome tracking but a very bad grip (slippery when wet), the tracking will effectively suffer too. It'd be like putting the best tracking engine ever on a 900 kilogram weight - it defeats the purpose. On the flipside, if a mouse has excellent tracking and excellent grip, it makes the tracking and the grip more worthwile. If it has a good grip and a good weight distribution, the weight distribution makes the good grip that much better. This synergy between the different elements of a mouse is what is really important to find in a good mouse - not just a checklist.
When you go to buy a mouse, you need to buy for performance. A nice big checklist isn't a bad thing, it usually just means you're covered. But you can't rely on it. You have to find a mouse whose elements complement each other. You can throw features at a mouse, but if they're not intelligently implemented, it's conceivable they could just get in the way of each other. One example I can think of is with ergonomics. You can have ergonomics that gives a good grip but has a poor weight distribution. This is present in so many mice, it is unbelievable. What's the point of this ergonomic grip if you're going make your wrist suffer because all the weight is in the back of the palm?
I'd appreciate feedback, especially on things to add to part 3.
Update2: I plan on adding some stuff about progamers and their equipment later. I also intend to talk about laser/optical trackers and a phenomenon called prediction.
Using trusty old logitech soccerball miniob in the meantime since i cant buy a new mouse because i'm a broke ass mofo. But birthday is coming up so i need to figure out what to get. loved my m518 but thinking about trying a razer this time, maybe diamondback 3g.
![[image loading]](http://www.acerdirect.co.uk/images_versions/7057.jpg)
