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Logitech is Relaunching the MX518 Gaming Mouse (venturebeat.com)
From a report: Logitech has announced it is bringing back the "legendary" (the company's word, not mine) MX518 gaming mouse. The announcement says "many consider [it] to be the finest gaming mouse of all time." I am definitely one of those people. Logitech first released the MX518 in 2005, as the successor to the already-pretty-good MX510 gaming mouse released in 2004. The MX518 was around for six years before Logitech tried to replace it with the G400 gaming mouse in 2011. I say "tried" because, well, it just wasn't the same. Logitech has finally admitted as much, after eight years of trying. The company is promising that the reborn MX518 will have the same shape and feel as the original. The materials have been updated, and there's a new "Nightfall" finish but, crucially, it's still an MX518.
Is the cable still designed to break after 1 year of use? I have like 3 of them in my drawer, with loose cables that randomly stop working once in a while.
Now that I already invested a shit-ton of money in a lightspeed pad and mouse, I sure as hell am not going to buy another mouse.
Not to mention that lately only chinesium crap came out of Logitech. I can buy honest chinesium crap for a fifth of the cost and have the same user experience.
Ever sense the move to the laser sensor from the roller ball. The default mouse that comes with the PC, or the one you get for $10 really seems to be good enough for most activities, including gaming. I am sure the MX518 may be good for the real competitive gamers, but for most of us our general skills at the game, will not be enhanced with a better mouse technology.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Using dongles sucks. However the M585 with both Bluetooth and a dongle, to be switched between at a button-press is about the most geek-friendly thing I've ever seen. I can use Bluetooth on my own laptop, shove a dongle into whatever I'm working on and switch at a button press. Great for servers, working on user equipment, setting up new systems you haven't paired Bluetooth with etc...
I've been grilling Logitech for years about bad choices in wireless connectivity, it seems like they're waking up finally.
As for a gaming mouse? Meh. Blue laser seems to be the best thing I've ever used and Logitech isn't the place to get that.
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In recent years my favorite mouse has been the G700s. Just the right amount of side buttons for my needs. I bought a few spares back when they were still $40.
I'm not sure why just about every Logitech gaming mouse at this point only has 2 thumb accessible buttons. There is the G602 with 6 buttons, which I have as a backup, but it just isn't as good.
I might consider this mouse for the fact that the original had no rubber coating on the buttons, but I don't believe the original was 100% coating-free. If they skip the coatings, I might try it out. I'm getting tired of having to replace my mice every few years because the coating gets all gunky.
What I want back is the original Trackman Marble USB Wheel, M/N T-BB18. But this time, I want them to use microswitches from someone more competent than Omron. I've re-switched this trackball three or four times now.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Using my MX518 from 2005 right now. That and a gaming mousepad i bought at the same time. Both have been through hell and still work great. Almost every day i roll up the mouse mat and coil up the MX518 and throw it in my backup. Can't risk WFH w/o it. I was hoping to see they made this a wireless version because that is one thing i would have hoped in 13 years they could fix the performance of. The cord is a hassle. All my coworkers fine it odd too that i have a wired mouse. No one does anymore but they also don't realize what an amazing piece of equipment this has been.
Scott
Yes, I can. At the very least I can after a few months of usage. Cheap mice quickly lose accuracy or start to jitter, or even jump around. This is annoying when trying to click at something reliably, not to mention that the damn cursor keeps wiggling about when you're typing because the mouse freaks out despite there being no input.
What it means to gamers that require pixel-perfect precision to aim their shots and whatnot, I guess I needn't say.
Is it worth it? I dunno, is it to you? Obviously to some people it is.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
having 20 buttons
I only have 17 tentacles!
Have gnu, will travel.
If we're going backwards I wish someone would put the middle button back in placed of making a wheel that is also clickable.
I have a few mice left with actual middle buttons, but they all seem to be second rate in other ways.
Can you really show me A/B testing that shows it is 6 times better than the $10 mouse at Fry's? How about even twice as better as the $5? It's like selling $500 sneakers to aspiring pro athletes.
I can't speak for the 518 (though I know a few who swear by it), but I've got a Corsair Scimitar Pro, and yes, it's worth the $60 I paid for it. Being able to assign keystroke combinations, text entries, and macros to the different buttons has helped me do repetitive tasks far more quickly than if I got stuck doing them by hand, and some of them are the sorts of things that don't lend themselves to bash scripts. For example, once I had to add 100 users, their e-mail addresses, and their folder shares to three different Xerox copiers - the right combination of alt+tabs, ctrl+c, ctrl+v, tab, arrow keys, and delays meant I was able to do that in about 15 minutes per copier. Did I mention they don't require an account or any sort of data mining?
Yes, there are other things that enable running macros at a system level, but the mouse is well worth it for the functionality.
I've been using a Logitech G5 Laser as my primary desktop mouse for close to a decade now, on an indigo Func Industries Surface 1030 mouse pad of the same vintage (smooth side).
Both remain optimal for desktop work.
Apparently there were some G5 mice that lacked the thumb buttons. Mine has two thumb buttons, and a tilt wheel, and the DPI controls.
I'm right handed, but I switched my mouse to my left hand a long, long time ago to reduce back pain. By doing so I position my mouse hand closer to my midline: my ancient Compaq keyboard has a full numeric keypad on the right hand side, which adds an extra seven full inches to my hand travel distance (6" home-to-mouse on the left side, 13" from home-to-mouse on the right side).
Irony: this makes the "thumb" buttons relatively useless.
Logitech G5 Laser Mouse: When an update is not worthy of a new name — July 2007
Reading more closely, I discover that the my G5 is the second edition of the G5, which is basically an MX518 upgrade product, with the same internal engine.
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My experience
I'm using maximal ballast weights which for me greatly improves proprioceptive feedback. Because this is a super sensitive mouse, I have my mouse response cranked up almost to ludicrous speed.
I have 45" of horizontal display travel (three 23" monitors, one in landscape, two in portrait). My full-bore mouse flick (45" bezel-to-bezel) measures just under 2" on my mouse pad. My 23" vertical throw on my portrait monitor measures just under an inch. (These are consistent numbers.) When I creep across, my horizontal throw measures closer to 3" instead of 2". (Turns out, I have far more speed and far less acceleration than I believed, prior to making this measurement just now.)
Interesting algebra: 100 dpi screen resolution * 20:1 fast-movement mouse response ratio = 2000 dpi mouse resolution requirement to address single pixels. Three resolutions available on mouse: 400/800/2000. For the 13:1 slow-movement response ratio (usual speed at the landing site), I'd need 1300 dpi for single pixel address. (Meaning that I do have to switch down to slow speed to access individual pixels, but once I do, I have a decent margin.)
I'm using roughly 5 square inches of mouse mobility to manage three 23" screens in text-selection mode, and ranging over all of 2 square inches for window and focus management.
Super important tip: use double-click drag to select text in full-word mode as often as possible. I always aim for the middle of my target word, double-click to select the full word (do not release the double-click) and then drag to select a word region, aiming for the middle of the final word, where I finally release the mouse button.
Sometimes one end of your text selection contains a weird punctuation mark, which makes for a narrow target. There are three solutions for this. The first solution is painfully precise initial aim (down to a single letter). This is bad. Try reversing the selection by starting at the other end (it's fairly rare that both ends are problematic). Painfully-precise final aim is still better than painfully-precise initial aim, because you're usually coming in much slower after starting the selection, and