Cougar MINOS X5 RGB Gaming Mouse
Cougar Gaming was founded in 2008 with the goal of manufacturing peripherals and components for PC enthusiasts who are passionate about gaming. My most recent experience with Cougar was with their Puri TKL keyboard, which I found to be a solid, well-manufactured unit that presented excellent value. Today, I am switching gears just a little bit and taking a look at a lightweight, high-performance gaming mouse, the Cougar Minos X5. With so many high-performance gaming mice out there, will Cougar be able to set itself apart from the competition with the Minos X5?
Keeping up with industry standards for high-performance gaming mice, Cougar went with a Pixart PMW3360 optical sensor capable of up to 12,000 DPI operations on the Minos X5. The PMW3360 optical sensor from Pixart offers pixel-accurate tracking without any acceleration in typical DPI ranges and is used in several top gaming mice, including my personal favorite Logitech G903 LightSpeed. For gamers who are absolutely serious about their mouse following their movements with absolute precision, the Pixart PMW3360 is an excellent choice of sensor for a mouse that is available for under $50.
Cougar allows users to set the Minos X5 gaming mouse at a 2000Hz polling rate from within the UIX software, which is absolutely ludicrous but cools at the same time. With its 2000Hz polling rate, rather than reporting to the PC in one millisecond intervals, the Cougar Minos X5 is tuned to report to the PC in .5 millisecond intervals. Will this make a difference to users and give them a competitive advantage? I have to say that with so many other factors affecting input latency present, the .5 millisecond polling rate improvement likely won’t be noticeable by even the most discerning competitive gamers. However, a faster polling rate does mean your PC will have the most accurate possible reporting from your mouse. If anything, it might just give you a bit of a mental edge and peace of mind knowing that your mouse is indeed reporting faster than the competition.