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Although Logitech’s G500 Gaming Mouse is the cheaper cousin to the company’s flagship gaming mouse, the G9x we reviewed in March, we much prefer this simpler rodent. It delivers nearly all the same features, and it’s a better fit for our hands.

It’s not a perfect though: We’d score the G500 even higher if it felt as comfortable as Logitech’s wireless Anywhere Mouse MX and used Logitech’s new Darkfield laser. We’re also not fans of the G500’s “battle-worn” finish, which makes the mouse look aged right out of the box. When we first opened our sample, we thought Logitech had sent us a unit that some sweaty product tester had been pounding on for the last six months. Yuck.

Features

The only feature the G500 lacks compared to the G9x is the interchangeable snap-on grips designed to accommodate the size of your hand. The G500 isn’t styled as aggressively, either. It looks more like a conventional mouse, with a shallow groove on the right side and a deeper one on the left to fit your pinkie and thumb, respectively. The three thumb buttons, however, are mounted further forward than they are on the G9x, a placement we found to be much easier to manipulate. We needed only to lift our thumb up to reach them, as opposed to lifting it up and bending it uncomfortably back as we did with the G9x.

We also prefer the placement of the G500’s micro-gear button. Having it located immediately behind the scroll wheel enables you to engage or disengage the wheel’s index function on the fly. This button is on the bottom of the G9x, which means you have to flip the mouse over to access it. The same goes for the buttons enabling you to make on-the-fly adjustments to the mouse’s sensitivity; these are placed to the left of the left mouse button, so that a slight repositioning of your index finger enables you to switch between three customizable presets. The G500’s laser resolution ranges from 200 to 5,700 dpi, enabling you to be as twitchy or as precise as you like. These presets come in handy while playing first-person shooters, enabling you to switch from run-and-gun mode with an assault rifle to stealth mode with a sniper scope with the push of a button.

Each button requires just the amount of resistance to activate, which is important if you tend to rest your index finger on the left “fire” button while gaming or editing photos. The only button that gave us any trouble was the middle thumb button in the cluster on the left side. We found it nearly impossible to squeeze it without also activating one of the buttons on either side. In the long run, we’d probably wind up just ignoring this one.

In addition to having five programmable buttons, the G500’s mass can be customized using removable weights. You can add as much as 27 grams to the mouse’s stock weight (taking it from 165 grams to 192 grams) by adding as many as six pellets to a tray that slides out of the bottom of the mouse. These weights can also be distributed front to back, left to right, or balanced.

Conclusion

In our book, Logitech would have the ultimate gaming mouse if they added their Darkfield laser technology to the G500 and ditched the whole “distressed” look – this is a mouse, not pre-washed denim. They’ve nailed everything else: the programmability, onboard memory for storing game profiles, the custom weights, and the way the mouse feels in our hand. Darkfield would add the ability to use the mouse on any surface-including glass.

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