As we expand our coverage from core computer products to peripherals (and in the end everything else) we are moving into gaming first. We have already tested out more than a few mechanical gaming keyboards (and have more to come). Now we are moving into gaming mice with an emphasis on mice that allow for more than just high-resolution lasers for optics. For our second product in this genre we are going to take a deep look at Thermaltake’s Tt eSports Saphira Gaming mouse. This mouse was designed by a professional Starcraft 2 gamer and packs in a solid list of features. Let’s check it out shall we?
The Box and Goodies -
The box that the Saphira ships in could be fairly sharp. Unfortunately there is a picture of Aleksey “White-ra” Krupnyk on the front which for some reason reminded me of the tech from Mission Impossible III. The style of the pose also brought images of NASCAR to mind. It sort of took away from the rest of the visuals on the front. Still pictures aside there are some items that are very important to note here like the 3500DPI laser, the onboard memory and the function lock.
Opening up the front we find some additional information and an odd choice in design. Looking at the middle picture you will see that Thermaltake chose to put all of the “on-the-fly” buttons on the bottom of the mouse. This means that to change the DPI, the profile, the polling speed or anything like that using just the mouse you have to turn it over. Now this is no problem if you are not in the middle of a game, but I have actually wanted to make these changes during game play (Medal of Honor, or Modern Warfare 2 and 3 when you are working as a sniper). Still we will have to see how these affect actual game play when we get to that stage.
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With the flap open you also get a good look at the Saphira mouse. It is a fairly stark looking product bordering on the plain.
Flipping over the box and looking on the back we find that Aleksey is a Professional Starcraft 2 gamer and that the idea behind the Saphira is for use with tactical games like Starcraft 2. It still should work for first person shooters and MMORG games. Again we will find out once we get into the performance part of our test.
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Inside the box the Saphira is in a nice plastic case to keep it safe during shipping. Once you get past that you will find that there are some nice goodies in the box. There are three case stickers (really stickers for anywhere). A carrying case, a manual, warranty booklet and a card that tells you where to grab the software for programing the Saphira.
