Creative's Sound BlasterX Siege M04 gaming mouse is a newer entry to their line of gaming peripherals and like the K08 keyboard it's left a good impression during my review. But, does the performance justify you buying it? Let's take a look.
Sound BlasterX M04
The Good
The Bad
Summary
Creative's Sound BlasterX Siege M04 gaming mouse is a newer entry to their line of gaming peripherals and like the K08 keyboard it's left a good impression during my review.
Specs
- Sensor:Â PixArt 3360 (200-12000DPI)
- Switches:Â Omron (50-million clicks)
- Buttons:Â 7
- Weight:Â 110g
- Connection:Â USB
- Warranty: 1-year
Details
Creative recently sent me the BlasterX Siege M04 gaming mouse for review and during my time using it I've been rather impressed. It looks great, performs awesome and is very comfortable to use for extended periods of time, however not everything the M04 has to offer is perfect.
This mouse doesn't have many flaws that stand out, but the most noticeable flaw would have to be the price. With an MSRP of $79.99 USD, the M04 is priced $10-$20 higher than competing mice like the Razer Mamba Tournament Edition and the Logitech G402 to name a couple. The BlasterX M04 can be found on sale for less than its MSRP, but the sale prices are often still higher than what you'd pay for one of the other mice I mentioned.
Price aside, the only other flaw that stands out lies within the RGB lighting, or lack thereof on certain parts of the mouse. Overall, this is a minor issue but the 'X' on the palm rest and the middle mouse button can only be set to a single color. This might not be an issue to most, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
Those 2 points aside, the M04 is an awesome mouse using a great sensor and high quality switches. It's very much on par with what you would expect from a sub-$100 mouse from a well-known company.
Performance
Performance-wise, the M04 is great, it uses high quality components that result in a high quality experience.
The sensor is a PMW3360 from PixArt which offers DPI scaling from 200-12000 DPS (not that you'll ever use 12000DPI), no acceleration, no prediction and a 1000MHz polling rate. It's common to see the PMW3360 in top level mice as its considered one of the best sensors out right now. It's safe to say you won't be having any issues with sensor accuracy.
Omron makes some of the most reliable switches for all sorts of things, including mice, so it's nice to see Omron switches (rated to 50-million clicks) in the M04 gaming mouse.
The only negative I was really able to find regarding the performance of the M04 is the lack of a left/right click on the middle mouse button, but overall that's a pretty small downside.
Design
The M04's design is something that I'm definitely a huge fan of, it's not over the top with RGB lighting and what it has offers a nice accent. The positioning of the thumb buttons are good and I don't find myself accidentally pressing them like with some other mice.
Regardless of the type of grip you use, whether that's palm, claw or fingertip, the M04 is going to be comfortable to use. The shape caters to any grip style and I found it to be one of the more comfortable mice that I've used. The rubber grips along each side help to compliment this comfort by adding some padding and extra grip for your pinky and thumb.
The Aurora RGB lighting is vivid and definitely helps to make this mouse stand out. It's customized through an easy-to-use software called Sound Blaster connect and offers a similar experience as other RGB customization programs. The only downside here is that not all areas can be customized - the middle mouse button is always white and the big "X" is always red.
When it comes to design, I generally have a hard time finding any cons in what Creative comes up with and this is true with the M04 gaming mouse as well.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Creative's Sound BlasterX M04 is an awesome choice if you're looking for a high quality RGB gaming mouse that doesn't have a huge price tag attached to it. During my time using the M04, I really enjoyed what it had to offer in terms of raw performance, but I was left wanting when it came to RGB customization.
