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EVGA TORQ X10 Gaming Mouse Review

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Mouse Testing & Results

A gaming mouse should offer quick– and adjustable– response, a crisp feel, and programmable buttons. The TORQ X10 offers all of these, and I used it in a variety of games ranging from Rise of the Triad (the re-release, not the original), Crysis 3, and Wolfenstein: The New Order. Playing on a 2560×1600 screen, I found that 1600dpi was the maximum I used and provided very fast response; I don’t see how the 8,200dpi setting would be useful unless you were running a multi-monitor setup with three or more monitors.

The two red buttons on the left side of the mouse fall easily to thumb, at least if you’re holding the mouse with your right hand. The corresponding buttons on the right, however, require a significant movement of your hand on the mouse to bring your middle or ring fingers into a position to press the buttons, especially the rear button. This limits the number of buttons you can reach easily during a fast-paced game, although you can re-purpose the DPI switch rocker if you have games in which you don’t need to change the mouse resolution while playing.

All in all I found this an excellent mouse for the FPS games I favor; the only feature I missed was a “sniper” button, that lowers the mouse resolution as long as it’s held down.

Macro Definition

One of the things I dislike about many new gaming peripherals is that their utility software comes without any documentation– in fact, these days, the software is not included with the device, but typically must be downloaded from the vendor’s web site. Macro definition in particular varies widely in its implementation, and I often have to spend more time than I’d like figuring out exactly how to use a specific utility’s macro features. EVGA Unleash is no different, so here’s how it works.

First, click the NEW button. This will place a default macro name in the first available slot (there are twelve slots, but you can only use the first nine). Type a name for your macro and press Return to save it. You may be tempted to simply click in one of the macro slots and start typing, and that will in fact work, but it will not clear any previous macro actions.

evga_torq_x10_macro_def_1

Press the RECORD button (the one with the red dot) and perform whatever actions you want to assign to this macro. Press the STOP button (white square) when you’re done. You’ll see your actions, recorded with millisecond precision, in the panel at the right. Note that if you want a consistent defined interval between each action, you can specify it with the Set All Intervals control near the bottom of the window. In this example I’ve defined a new macro, Test 1, and assigned it the action of typing the letter “Q”.

evga_torq_x10_macro_def_2

Click the SAVE button to send the macro definition to the mouse. This is critical. If you forget this step and click NEW to start another macro, you’ll erase your existing macro definition. Below you can see I’ve created a new macro, Test 2, and assigned it some scroll-wheel action as well as typing. I’ll click SAVE and I’m done.

evga_torq_x10_macro_def_3

But you might be confused by what you see if you now click on Test 1:

evga_torq_x10_macro_def_4

Even though Test 1 is selected, the macro definition shown is that for Test 2. Confusing? You bet! You must remember the click the LOAD button whenever you select a new macro to read the macro definition back from the mouse into the utility:

evga_torq_x10_macro_def_5

In other words, when you’re looking at existing macro definitions, you must press LOAD after selecting each macro. EVGA Unleash doesn’t seem to have a way to keep all a profile’s macros loaded at once, so you have to remember while working with macro definitions to click SAVE to save each one, individually, and LOAD to load each one that you’re looking at, individually.

You can save existing macros to your computer using the Macro Management tab as shown below. This is a mechanism you can use to copy macros between profiles: save the macro, switch to the new profile, then load the macro.

evga_torq_x10_utils_macro_management

To assign your newly defined macro to a mouse button, you must return to the Button Settings screen, and therein lies a problem I have with this software: to assign a macro, you choose the button from the list on the right (oddly labeled Overview) and then click on “Macro” in the list at the left. This opens a popup menu labeled simply “Macro 1”, “Macro 2″…”Macro 9” (although you can create Macro 10, Macro 11, and Macro 12, there’s no way to assign them to a button) rather than using the names you assigned to the macros. So although I’ve created a macro called “Switch_Fire” as shown above, it’s just “Macro 1” as far as the button settings panel is concerned. Not being able to see the macro names when you’re making button assignments is a real drawback.

evga_torq_x10_macro_assignment

Each group of macros belongs to a Profile, and your current profile is always shown at the bottom left of the window. Profiles include all mouse settings, not just macros: everything from the DPI settings to the LED colors and brightness are included. This is handy since you can define different color scheme for each profile and tell which one is active just be glancing at your mouse. As with individual macros, profiles can be either stored in the mouse memory or saved to the hard disk.
evga_torq_x10_utils_profiles

Having the mouse store and execute macros using its onboard CPU and memory means that you can take your mouse to different computers and have all your macro definitions come along with you. This is convenient but it does mean that the mouse can’t automatically set the correct profile based on the game you’re playing, as is possible with software-based macro systems.

So what’s my overall impression of the EVGA TORQ X10 mouse?


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