All computer mice allow you to click, scroll and move a cursor. What makes one mouse better than another? What makes a gaming mouse? Well beyond reliability and responsive tracking, it’s customization, comfort, and functionality. When all of your in-game attacking, navigating, and aiming is accomplished via mouse, the mouse becomes an integral component to your gaming system.
One of the most important qualities of a good mouse is its precision and accuracy. The kind of optical sensor and its resolution (measured in DPI) matters.
Laser vs Optical Sensor
Basic desktop mice typical feature optical sensors and an LED. The latest feature in gaming mice is lasers, but is it all it’s cracked up to be? It’s important to note that in laser mice the sensor is still an optical sensor. The mouse just uses a laser for illumination instead of a red or infrared LED. A laser will illuminate the structure of the mousepad but this realty doesn’t matter since you’re just measuring distance. This makes laser mice particularly sensitive to soft mouse pads with more surface depth – in that situation the laser will illuminate more surface depth and the sensor will pick up useless information, which leads to poor performance in low speeds.
Resolution (DPI)
The resolution of a mouse (measured in DPI) effectively controls how fast and accurately you can move the cursor. Based on this you may think that mice with higher DPI are better. This may be true in some cased, but not in others. Sometimes different versions of mice will use the same optical sensor, but one mouse may achieve a higher DPI by dividing each pixel into four. It has a higher DPI rating, but this could cause a problem where the optical sensor begins to send errors due to signal noise. This can cause spurious motion where the mouse doesn’t move, but the cursor moves because the optical sensor is detecting the signal noise and interpreting is as motion. Many of today’s mice come with an option to adjust DPI on-the-fly so you can switch between fast-moving low DPI when you need wild movement, or slow-moving high DPI when you need control and accuracy for a shot.
Ergonomics and Customization
The ergonomics of a mouse are also very important. You’re going to be using your mouse of hours at a time so make sure it’s comfortable and has a good grip. Top-tier gaming mice will have removable weights so you can set the weight of your mouse. On some models you can even adjust the center of balance. Many mice also feature additional buttons besides the click surfaces so you can program macro commands for quick weapon selection, etc. This is particularly useful in real-time strategy and MOBA games like League of Legends and DOTA 2.
At AVADirect we offer many different mouse options, from basic desktop wireless mice to high-DPI laser mice with many customizable buttons.
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