A new mouse for me, to test and play, let’s see how this mouse from PNY holds out against the others I own. ‘NEVER LET GO of you enemies’ is what is printed on the front of the box, for me it’s ‘keep your friends close but your enemies closer’, with up to 4000DPI and a High-Speed Optical Sensor, all information printed on the front, as well as a full view of the mouse you are thinking of purchasing. Well, why else are your reading this review or looking at it in your local shop? The front of the box also has a flip lid, this allows you to view the mouse in all its glory, so you can decide if this is the mouse for your or not.
On the side, PNY note some of the killer features this mouse has, which include the following;
- ON-THE-FLY DPI SWITCHING
Be ready whenever needed, PNY Riot01 features an on-the-fly DPI switch letting you adjust the sensitivity to any situation, whether dealing with active assaults or precise sniper headshots, never let go of your enemies.
- UP TO 4,000 DPI
Adapt to your environment, and to your gameplay, with a customisable sensitivity from 250 up to 4000 DPI, your sweet spot is covered in any situation.
- HIGH-SPEED OPTICAL SENSOR
Never lose the track, with our high-speed AVAGO sensor, promising ultra-fast gaming by targeting your exact mouse location.
- 6 PROGRAMMABLE BUTTONS
At your fingertips, keep your weapons reachable with PNY RIOT01 customizable buttons, and never miss the target again.
- ADJUSTABLE BACKLIT
Match your colour, and your game with up to 16 million colours, adjust your mouse’s backlit to your style.
Moving to one of the side PNY promote other products tell sell, which include SSD’s and Graphic Cards. Finally moving to the back there are some specifications
- Connectivity: USB,1.8m cable
- Design: ergonomic, right-handed
- Tracking device: high-speed Avago optical sensor
- Tracking resolution: from 1000 up to 4000 dpi
- Responsiveness: up to 1000 Hz polling rate
- Software features: customizable colour scheme (up to 16 million colours), up to 4 custom gaming profiles
- Requirements: internet connection for software downloads windows XP and later os.
Let’s not miss anything, time to look at the mouse, and it is by far wow, eye-catching, a nice glossy red, against matt black, this will not hide away on your mouse mat, unless your mouse mat is red, which is rare, I have not seen one or own one. There is a clear plastic XLR8 logo on the mouse, near the back which lights up and right down at the bottom of the back is the PNY logo. This mouse is ergonomic for the right-hand user, left-hand users, well, you, well this is not the mouse for you sorry. The ergonomic features and very distinctive as you can see from the image above. Wondering what I mean, well ergonomic relates the design and comfort of a product, as you can see from the images this is very true.
The left of the mouse is deep and textured so your thumb rests comfortably for long period of gaming, there is also two mouse buttons that are easy to press and reach which you thumb, there two buttons by default offer forward and backwards for your default browser. Moving to the right-hand side of the mouse, there is another area, shallower than the thumb zone, which allows you to rest your finger/s on, both sides are perfectly designed for the right-hand gamer at heart.
Head down to the front of the mouse you have left and right trigger buttons, as seen on every mice we buy (I guess) these buttons are crafted using plastic and come with a nice tactile click, damn nice to use and rest your finger on.
Something I rarely see, a metal texture mouse wheel, not the mouse wheel or textured rarely seen, but metal, what is this, which also has LED lighting flowing through the middle, damn this is a nice feature. The DPI button is above the wheel, but one? What happened here, should there not be two? With there only being one, you have to cycle through each DPI setting, instead of up down, this sucks.
PNY take a note here V2 please give us two DPI buttons not one.
Going down under, well underneath the mouse to be exact, PNY have opted to use an off white design approach, does look good, don’t get more wrong, and blends in well with the red as the base colour for the mouse. There is also four Teflon feet to help the mouse glide effortlessly over any surface to a degree of course. Oh yeah, nice job PNY braided cable, red and black, good design, but no gold plated USB, not a huge loss, just a shame, ‘Braided Cord’ equals no tangles.
Gaming, this is a mouse for gaming and it does a good job for an entry level mouse at such a low price of £27.31, such a strange amount was expecting £29.99. The mouse is accurate and works well, it’s just a shame that the max DPI is so low, 4000 DPI, I guess, for some gamers, it will be ok, for others it might not be all that good.
As stated before On-The-Fly DPI switch is shit, should have two, one up one down, not just one and you have to scroll through each setting, this lets the mouse down, there is not even an onscreen display notification letting you know your current DPI setting, something I think needs to be improved upon with V2.
Remapping keys are possible, I remapped the side buttons, middle click and I also changed the DPI button to something else, there is not much to be played with here, but anything is better than nothing, so you can also macro up if you wish, yep thought I would chuck that in there.
The optical sensor, does an OK job for what it is, differently not as good as a Laser guided mouse, so I would recommend using this on a mouse mat, do not use it on a black surface like a table, or a see through surface, you will find that the mouse not perform.
The mouse seems to work rather well, during gaming sessions, and I also used it with Photoshop, lowered the settings and was able to tackle those really precise aspects when drawing. The mouse buttons always seem accurate which little no force required to activate, there also seemed to be no sign of lag.
Under palm the mouse felt great, I don’t see this mouse being that great for users that prefer the claw grip due to its design, but other grips should be no issue. I love the design, the textured feel, the resting positions, I actually liked many aspects of this mouse, so cannot really complain. If you sweat a lot under palm like me, perspiration will build up and you will see yourself cleaning some areas of the mouse a lot, to me that’s nothing new, that why I have a fan near my mouse to keep my palm sweat free.
But for a budget mouse, it’s really great, for its price it’s bloody awesome. Textured, Ergonomic, LED Lighting, DPI Control, Braided Cable, you would be looking at a lot more if you went for the likes of SteelSeries or Razer or even Logitech, for the same sort of specs offered with this mouse.
Everything about this mouse is Good, not excellent as there can be some improvements made, but of course, with improvements would equal an increase in cost.
So pros?
- Good Sensor when used on a mouse mat, textured surface
- Nice clicks on all mouse buttons require little to no force
- Comfortable under palm thanks to its ergonomic design
- Lighting
- Good software
The Cons?
- Not a great grip
- Lift up distance a little short
- Not suitable for claw grip users
- DPI buttons kind of sucks, and we feel there needs to be two buttons and on-screen display.
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