TheAlienware Pro Wireless Gaming Mouseis a high-tech, ultra-lightweight mouse designed by esports competitors, for esports competitors. It comes at a hefty price tag of $149.99, but its advanced features such as an ultra-fast 8KHz polling rate and proprietary magnetic-force clicking may justify the price for esports competitors looking to up their game.
Alienware Pro Wireless Gaming Mouse
The Alienware Pro Wireless Gaming Mouse offers superb gaming performance through rapid polling rates, an ultra-lightweight build, and magnetic-force clicking. It is a superb option for competitive gamers, but its optimization for gaming may make it unideal for more casual players, especially with the $149.99 price tag.
Price and Availability
The Alienware Pro Wireless Gaming Mouse is available for $149.99 directly from Dell (Alienware’s parent company), as well as from Best Buy and Amazon.
Specifications
Its Build Is Lightweight and Sleek
The Alienware Pro Wireless Gaming Mouse is one of the lightest-weight mice in existence, weighing under 60g (0.13 lbs), and it does so while being primarily made of recycled plastic. It also features a symmetrical, ambidextrous design, making it usable for any gamers who use their left hands.
The mouse is incredibly durable, being rated to withstand over 70 million clicks. It also has proprietary magnetic-force clicking on its buttons for a satisfying and reliable click.
In addition to the essentials of a mouse—the two main buttons and a scroll wheel—this device also has two additional thumb buttons on the right side, as well as a power switch and DPI adjustment button on the bottom to toggle between DPI settings of 400, 800, 1200, 1600, and 2400.
Settings can be further adjusted in the Alienware Control Center software.
Features Are Designed for Gamers to Win
Like its related keyboard, the Alienware Pro Gaming Wireless Keyboard, the product was designed in collaboration with Team Liquid to address needs specific to esports competitors. This effort shows in the mouse’s features designed for gamers to have a hardware advantage.
For example, the mouse has a polling rate far above average, switchable between 4KHz and 8KHz, which means a response time of 0.25ms or 0.125ms respectively. Many other mice have polling rates at around 1KHz or 2KHz. The difference may be negligible for daily tasks, but in high-speed gaming scenarios, this may make the difference between landing the game-winning shot or not. However, a faster polling rate does reduce battery life, so you might consider lowering it when not gaming.
One more feature making it ideal for competitive gamers is magnetic-force clicking. Alienware uses proprietary technology to reduce debounce time on clicks, allowing for a more consistent clicking experience: the mouse will not get stuck. This magnetic-force clicking feature also makes the act of clicking highly satisfying.
Simplicity is Key, and a Drawback
This mouse is perfectly tailored for gaming and a lightweight build, with a simple, streamlined experience. However, that simplicity comes with drawbacks.
First, it has very few buttons for a gaming mouse. The only buttons for inputs are left click, right click, the scroll wheel and its click, and two thumb buttons. Many gamers may lament the lack of additional keys for additional controls and mapping macros.
Similarly, its sleek, ambidextrous design is fantastic to use for gaming, but it may not be ideal for all-day usage. If you are using your next mouse for both work and gaming, you may want a more ergonomic option, especially one with more buttons.
Last, its lighter weight makes it phenomenal for ease of movement when gaming, but it also makes the mouse feel fragile. I didn’t experiment with this, but I imagine a drop would be more likely to damage this mouse than a sturdier, heavier option.
This mouse is perfectly optimized for elite gaming, but by trimming the excess for simplicity and light weight, some desirable features were lost.
Connectivity Is Limited but Effective
This mouse only connects via a 2.4GHz USB-C dongle or by plugging it in with a USB-A to USB-C cable. For a $149 mouse, I would have expected Bluetooth as an option.
However, for a high-performance gaming mouse, it’s likely 2.4 GHz is faster and more stable. With the emphasis on a lightweight build, it makes sense to eschew Bluetooth to save a gram or two.
Another inconvenience with connectivity is that both this mouse and its partner keyboard, the Alienware Pro Gaming Wireless Keyboard, use different dongles entirely. Most PC gaming is done on desktop PCs, which tend to skimp on USB-C ports. so requiring two for a full-fledged Alienware keyboard mouse combo is inconvenient.
Included converters to connect these USB-C dongles to USB-A ports lessen this issue. However, adding Bluetooth connectivity on the mouse or the ability to pair it with the keyboard’s dongle to consolidate ports would have been convenient.
Software Is Helpful but Underutilized
In the Alienware Control Center software, you can customize this mouse, such as by programming macros. This would be an incredibly useful feature if the mouse had more buttons. Macro customization is certainly nice to have, but this mouse’s lightweight design with minimal buttons does not utilize it well.
However, the software does have one key customization feature: adjusting your polling setting. Most gamers will want to set their polling rate to 8KHz, the fastest setting, as well as possibly checking their current DPI setting to ensure the mouse is properly customized. Otherwise, beyond these features, the main appeal of the software is quick and easy firmware updating for the mouse.
Alienware Delivers on Gaming
Despite a few design quirks and the poor ability to utilize its software, this mouse’s design for esports competition shows. Its extremely light weight makes it effortless to control, making your aiming reticule feel like an extension of your arm. Users of heavier mice like the Logitech MX Master series may require some adjustment, but this featherweight mouse is a joy to use in gaming.
I am not competitive enough of a gamer to personally identify the difference a faster polling rate makes, but in testing this mouse in FPS titles, my aim certainly felt better. Moreover, the mouse buttons were extremely satisfying in their tactile feeling and sound. This was a sharp contrast for the better compared to almost every other mouse I own. That said, others will hear the clicks on this mouse, and your mic will probably capture them too, if you use this mouse for streaming.
Should You Buy the Alienware Pro Wireless Gaming Mouse?
TheAlienware Pro Wireless Gaming Mouseis truly outstanding when it comes to gaming, but the $149.99 price tag is quite high. For a high-level esports competitor, the difference in polling rate, weight, and clicking speed would likely make a perceivable difference and justify the cost. However, a more casual gamer likely wouldn’t notice the difference. If you are bad at a game, it probably isn’t your mouse holding you back.
Thus, this mouse’s hefty price tag makes sense for gamers who have invested in their skills, but more casual gamers aiming to improve their performance may get a better return on investment by applying intentional practice to their gameplay to improve their skills.
Nevertheless, if you’re able to afford the cost and want one of the best gaming mice on the market, this may be right for you.
