A gaming mouse is essential if you want to be competative playing FPS (COD4, CSS, etc).

I started with the Logitech G5 and recently bought a Razer Copperhead. My thoughts:

They're both excellent. If you like to palm the mouse, the G5 fits in my entire hand much better. But I noticed this helps me grip it tighter which can cause me to be tense (and less effective). The copperhead does not fit the palm and cannot be gripped tightly. It's made to be held by the fingers with light contact from the palm. This makes it impossible to be tense, but sometimes it feels like there's less control.

They both do 2000dpi and 1000mhz response. The G5 has 2 left side buttons, the scroll wheel can be pressed as a button, and you can tilt the wheel to each side for two additional buttons. It has two buttons below the wheel...a total of 9 button, but only 8 are easy to use. The copperhead has two buttons on each side and a pressable wheel for a total of 7 buttons. The two buttons on the right side are difficult to use though...I'd say it has 5 usable buttons.

When switching weapons with the wheel, I find the G5 to be better. For some reason, I repeatedly screw up weapon swapping with the copperhead. However the copperhead's pressible wheel button is better. Because the G5 wheel can be tilted left/right, pressed, and rolled it's easy to accidentally do several of these at once when you're just trying to just press it for example.

Lastly, the "feet" or contact patches of the G5 are much larger than the contact patches of the copperhead resulting in much more friction with the mousepad on the G5. You can also add weights to the G5 to make it heavier. The end result is the G5 feels more stable and controlled, but also slower and sluggish, and can promote a tense grip that will hurt your reflexes. The copperhead is lighter, feels quicker, and more fluid, but it also feels harder to control.

Right now I'm using both and trying to decide which I like better. Has anyone tried multiple gaming mice? Any thoughts or preferences?

Seems like good contenders are G5, G7, G9, MX518, Lachesis, Copperhead, Death Addler.

1. None of those games are out yet. Let's count our chickens after they hatch.

2. Thus far, the 360 has won most graphical comparisons. The PS3 has yet to prove it's as powerful. So far it has proven that it's at least very nearly as powerful.

3. KZ2 previews do look amazing. But you have to remember the budget for that game is huge, about 10x Gears 2. If it looks better than gears 2, then it's not reasonable to conclude that it is due to the PS3's power. Games with large budgets should look better than games with smaller budgets, expecially when KZ2's thunder is graphics...you can bet a great deal of the budget was spent on making it look good.

Everytime Sony releases a new console, they hype it as some supercomputer that will pwn all. Historically, this has never been then case. PS2 was the weakest system in terms of power last gen. This gen...well the PS3 can claim to be more powerful than the Wii.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/cpu-graphics-overclocking,2082.html

If you shop around, apply rebates, etc you can easily build this PC for ~$550 or less. This is a very respectable rig that will play most games at 1080p on high (except Crysis, you'll need to play on medium or lower the resolution like everyone else). This rig will massacre games at the typical 720p console resolution.

PC gaming is not expensive.

You do not have to upgrade constantly. It would be retarded to upgrade this rig any sooner than 2 years from now.

If you only play consoles, and have never given the PC a chance, you just don't know what you're missing.

1. You haven't seen good graphics

2. You don't know what good controls are. The console version of PC games (COD4, COD WaW, etc) having "aiming" assist because the controller is so awkward. It takes time to get used to the mouse and keyboard, but there's no argument that m+k will beat any controller in any FPS competition. Even so, you can get all types of controllers for the pc.

3. You miss out on entire genre's

Not owning a gaming PC and calling yourself a hardcore gamer, is like only owning a Wii and calling yourself a gamer. You're a kiddie and just don't know it yet.

I used to only play consoles, but I gave PC gaming a chance. Now, it's really hard to go back.

All JRPG's are the same. It's an old, worn out genre that hasn't evolved in years. If you want a good story, read a book. If you want a good video game, play something else.

This is why GS has been giving JRPG's low scores. If you notice, GS gives the best scores to games that do something new, or better, or in some manner evolve the genre.

To be fair, I've never played a JRPG that I've liked. The moment I see girly looking guys with long spiked hair, I know it's going to suck. But I never tried the SNES or PS1 JRPG's...maybe they were good. But it seems to me that 10 years later the only thing that has changed is prettier CGI cutscenes. That's pathetic.

Yeah, it's looking really intense and visceral. This game + MGS4 just may push me over the edge and make me get a PS3. A price cut would definitely seal the deal though.

Next generation of consoles will be much different. Consoles will stop competing with PC's. Starting with xbox, consoles have been competing with PC's. PS3 and Xbox360 are aimed directly at the PC. They share many of the sames games. There's even talk of "PC gaming dying," etc.

PC gaming will never die because PC's will never die. People will always buy PC for other applications. As long as there are PC's, someone will make games for them. What we currently have is PC's, consoles that are trying to be PC's, and then video game consoles (the Wii). What we won't have next generation is the middle group. The Wii distroyed the 360 and the PS3, and their whole strategy. It's dead. It won't be back.

I would be amazed if Microsoft and Sony again decide to build a powerful console, risk billions, sale it at a loss, etc like they did this gen after seeing what Nintendo did with the Wii. With the way the stock market is right now...neither company will risk billions again on a high power console. It won't happen. The next generation of consoles will all be aimed at competing with Nintendo's Wii (or Wii 2). They'll be realitively low power and inexpensive. The games will be focused "casual fun" style gameplay, not on multimillion dollar tech fests. They will probably follow the Wii model of making money on every console sold (not selling them at a loss).

If I'm wrong, and Sony and MS aren't giving up on the high tech console, then this generation will last much longer than originally anticipated. There's no way either company will invest billions anytime soon on another high tech console. But if the market changes and strengthens over the next 5 years, maybe we'll see another high tech console in 2012, etc.

Thus far Nintendo is the only current company that is successful with gaming. Microsoft has invested billions on the xbox brand, and has turned a profit, but it's not nearly has profitable as windows, etc. Basically, xbox hasn't been a good investment yet (it may never be). Sony made a killing on the PS1 and PS2, but has given all that money back plus more with the PS3. I wouldn't be surprised if either (or both) Sony and Microsoft abandon consoles all together.

Worth thinking about

xbox 1 never even dreamed of outselling PS2 for a minute in Japan, much less actually doing it for a 2 weeks.

Compared with the success of PS2 and the expectations for PS3, Sony has failed miserably. The PS3 survives on name alone. But the PS4 had better deliver because far fewer people will see "Playstation" and assume it's awesome after the PS3 debacle.

Fanboys will defend it, but gamers are disapointed with Sony. Microsoft delivered: xbox360 is better than xbox. Microsoft is getting better. Nintendo did what they had to do to survive (and it's working better than they imagined). But Sony dropped the ball.

Looks like we're having trouble with our reading comprehension.

Sony has lost over 3 billion on the PS3. What this article is saying is that Sony is still losing money on the PS3, but they think the bleeding will stop in 2009. Sony hopes that after 2009, the PS3 will start to pay back the 3 billion it lost. By then, it will probably be around 4 billion lost.

Isn't this another way of saying: "Just Wait?"

I guess I didn't realize that Sony has adopted this as their new marketing slogon.

Reality check time folks.

1. "Future Proof." This is simply a retarded phrase. Reality: Technology is outdated before it even hits store shelves. History has shown that CPU power doubles every 2 years. This has held true for the past 50 years. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moores_law

In 2016, PC's will 32x as powerful as the PS3. True it's not exactly that simple, but when it comes to CPU's, GPU's, etc there's no such thing as "future proof."

2. Sony supported the PS1 and the PS2 for 10 years. This is true, but both the PS1 and PS2 had something in common: They were both extremely successful and dominated the console market with tremendous market share. They both had many exclusive franchises. If you wanted to play those games, you had to buy the Sony console. Sony continued to support PS2 and PS1 because it WAS VERY PROFITABLE to do so.

In contrast, the PS3 is not successful yet. Sony has not recovered the billions it has lost on PS3 yet. http://kotaku.com/5018899/sony-lost-over-3-billion-to-ps3-cost-pricing-imbalance

It has lost many of its huge exclusive franchises (GTA, Final Fantasy, Devil May Cry, Virtua Fighter, Beautiful Katamari, to name a few and the list is growing).

Lastly, the PS3 is anything but dominant in terms of market share. It's currently in last place.

Conclusion:

Forget about future proof. The phrase insults your intelligence. 10 year console? Maybe. But I wouldn't consider it to be a sure bet.