SteelSeries Rival 650 Wireless Review

Towards the end of 2018, I got myself the new SteelSeries Rival 650 wireless gaming mouse to take over from the Rival 600. Don’t get me wrong the 600 version is an amazing mouse, literally perfect, but the idea of no cords, just makes it even more perfect. The question I asked myself though is simple, has SteelSeries created the best wireless mouse ever with perfect, pin point report rate and accuracy.

So Let’s find out.

On the front, they make no mention of RGB lighting, was this a mistake? maybe, maybe not, as the mouse image, on the front of the packaging, taken from a top-down view, you do see, what looks like RGB lighting, but it could also be printed colours. What they do showcase on the front of the box is the following;

• 2.4GHz Lag-Free Wireless with fast charging
• True 1 to 1 Tracking pinpoint Accuracy  – what does this mean?

Well, this mouse uses Two Sensors, the actual sensor is called Truemove 3, the mouse has the main sensor with 12,000 CPI (DPI) ‘the higher the CPI/DPI, the faster the cursor moves with mouse movement.’ But instead of just focusing on CPI, the sensor uses 1 to 1 tracking, which simply means move your mouse a certain distance on the pad, the same distance will be represented on your screen, without introducing latency, interpolation, or affecting jitter reduction.

The other sensor measures depth perception, lift off distance, ‘the Rival 600 deploys a state-of-the-art dedicated depth sensor to achieve the world’s lowest and most accurate lift-off distance’.

If you want to know more SteelSeries has created a short video and here it is below if you want to know more than that head on over to the address https://steelseries.com/blog/truemove3-optical-sensor-37

The last thing they want you to know is something called 256 Weight and Balance Configuration. As you can see from the image below of the mouse, both sides can be removed and up to 8 metal blocks are viewable between the mouse side and the mouse itself. These are weights 4g weights, they allow you to to create the perfect weight balance for you from light to heavy, giving you the perfect customisation and configuration.

What do they mean thought by 256 Weight and Balance Configurations, well it is simply tuning the mouse’s center of gravity with the weights for the perfect grip or gameplay style.

Turning the package to one of its sides, you get to know about some of its features, but I felt it needed more, so here is the full list.

Sensor System

• Sensor System – SteelSeries TrueMove3+ Dual Sensor System
• Primary Sensor – TrueMove 3 Optical Gaming Sensor
• Secondary Sensor – Depth Sensing Linear Optical Detection
• CPI – 100–12000 in 100 CPI Increments
• IPS – 350+, on SteelSeries QcK surfaces
• Acceleration – 50G
• Hardware Acceleration – None (Zero Hardware Acceleration)
• Lift Off Distance – Customizable, 0.5–2 mm

Design

• Top Material – Black Soft Touch
• Core Construction – Fiber-Reinforced Plastic
• Shape – Ergonomic, Right-Handed
• Grip Style – Universal
• Number of Buttons – 7
• Switch Type – SteelSeries Switch, rated for 60 million clicks
• Illumination – 8 RGB Zones, Independently Controlled
• Weight– 121 g / 4.2 ounces without cable. – Customizable up to 153 g / 5.4 ounces
• Length – 131 mm / 5.2 inches
• Width – 62 mm (front), 62 mm (middle), 69 mm (back) / 2.4 inches (front), 2.4 inches (middle), 2.7 inches (back)
• Height – 27 mm (front), 43 mm (back) / 1.1 inches (front), 1.7 inches (back)
• Cable Type – Detachable, Soft Rubber
• Cable Length – 2 m / 6.5 ft

Moving to the back of the package you get to see that both sides of the mouse come away from the mouse itself and allows 8 x 4g weights for each side. Steelseries also provide more information about the battery, which they state will last 24 hours + with a rapid 10minute charge can give 10hours of game time. They also note the wireless gaming-grade connection of 2.4GHz with a 1msreport rate with advanced frequency hopping which provides lag-free gaming without the cord.

Now comes the time we all enjoy unboxing our new device

RISE UP AND BE COUNTED

There is some text on the internal packaging, though I feel it is not that easy to read with the picture above, so here it is.

We don’t play games to escape reality. We play to rewrite it.

We’re the esports professionals and the pubstars.

The 1hp heroes and the bottom of the scoreboard zeros.

The streamers and the dreamers.

Whether you win lose or ragequit – that’s all on you.

But remember that reality is not a limit

GLHF

Pulling the lid down reveals the mouse, tucked away nice and safe, with the instruction manual tucked inside a pocket and the cable and weights tucked away in a small box below the mouse.

The instruction manual offers the basics of using the mouse from setting the mouse up, where to download the engine UI from for the RGB lights and much more and how to use the weights.

The packaging is top notch, Quality products deserve quality packaging. 

Now this mouse has the same design as the Rival 600 version, I loved that mouse and I love this mouse, even more, this is what I said about the 600 version and it is exactly the same for the wireless version.

‘Picking this mouse up for the first time, I instantly got that feeling, and I said to myself “This mouse feels damn nice” and super light. I love the comfort groves that have been added to the main buttons so your fingers can find a nice resting spot. The three rubber grips on the underside of the mouse help with the mouse glide smoothly across hard and soft surfaces. I used the mouse with the QCK Prism Mouse Pad, which offers both hard and soft surfaces, just in case you were wondering.

There are rubber grips on both sides of the mouse which help with grip while gaming, I never felt my fingers move once or slip off during any game, even though I was worried as there is no sort of lip on the right-hand side for added grip. The two front buttons where you rest your fingers and the back of the mouse are both rubberised and pick up sweet and grease rather easy. Before I even started using the mouse there was already fingerprints visible on the mouse, this is something a Razer Mouse does not suffer from.

There is RBG lighting on this mouse as well, the lighting starts around the center and moves down the sides, there is also lighting on the mouse wheel and the logo at the back of the mouse, as always everything is controlled by the SteelSeries Engine UI.

Here is the launch Video where you can see the mouse in action and its RBG lighting’

We all have different grip styles with both the 600 and the 650 I preferer to use Claw Grip just so I can use all buttons, all other styles were just impossible to use due to my hand size. Though the design of the mouse allows the mouse to be used in all grip styles.

Now comes the software using SteelSeries Engine 3.0 which is available for both Windows and Mac, and works the all SteelSeries peripherals that require the engine to config.

The screen above, gives us a good indication of what is available to customize, the main focus, left hand of the screen, we can alter and assigned our keys to all 7 buttons, this also includes macros that you can create and assign.

On the right-hand side, you can control your CPI/DPI, you can set up a total of two, which should be more than enough for the majority of us gamers. I have one set for gaming and one set for working on Photoshop.

Lift off distance is a bit of a bitch, I found that if I lifted the mouse up and change the lift-off distance, it did not recode, but when I left the mouse down and change the lift-off distance everything seemed to work correctly.

Other software performance enhancements available include the following

• Polling Rate – controls how often the computer will communicate with the device
• Angel Snapping – Helps straighten out and snap your lines
• Acceleration & Deceleration – modify your mouse cursor speed, based on the speed you move the mouse.

Then finally above you get your illumination, which for me, this is what I buy many gaming products for of late, RGB LED Lighting.

Now Games, towards the end of 2019 what did I play? Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Assassin Creed Odyssey, Two Point Hospital, Forza Horizon 4, more Black Desert Online, Total War Warhammer 2 and most likely plenty more. I had to go back to DOOM to test the mouse spin out, this is simply, A good sensor would stop any spin out and when you stop the mouse, the animation of your character on screen should also stop. Happy to say the SteelSeries Rival 650 Performs well.

When playing games, my hand felt comfortable resting on the mouse for long periods of time, even when working on the site and using photoshop. I started to use palm grip in the end and just ignored the furthest button, but when gaming claw grip was just as comfortable. I love playing both Assassin Creed Odyssey and Shadow of the Tomb Raider throughout the whole campaign and wanted more, the mouse performed admirably throughout.

If you are an eSport star, this mouse will be perfect for you during such games as Overwatch, CS: GO and any other game that requires quick movements and precision firing with perfect accuracy. The charge time is amazing and the amount of time the mouse will last is just astounding.

So what did we find out, well if you have and like the Rival 600 and want no wires, then the Rival 650 fits perfectly, its suits all grip styles, you can augment it with weights to suit you and your play style.

Again,  this mouse is possibly the next best mouse when it comes to choosing what mouse to own, the feel, design, sensor, almost everything is spot on. But as with the 600 it picks up grease from your hands so you will be cleaning it a lot of the time if you are anything like me and like your items looking good. There is also the lack of a Left-hand version for left-hand users, so maybe at somepoint bring that in as well.