CoolerMaster have been round for a while now and they are continuously pumping out new products which keeps getting better and better quality. Today we have our hands on the CM Storm Sentinel Advanced II which is one of CoolerMaster’s gaming peripherals, which happens to be very similar to the Z3RO-G. The unique LED appearance to the mouse really grabs peoples attention and its a nice little touch to make it different compared to its other competitors.
Specifications
- Right-hand Ergonomic Design
- 200-8200 DPI Tracking Resolution
- On The Fly DPI Tuning
- 1.5mm Lift-Off Distance
- Up To 150 IPS -3.8m/s
- 128kb Built In Memory For Profiles
- 5 Profiles
- 8 Programmable Buttons
- 9 Virtual Buttons
- Customisable LED Light System
Appearance And Build
What I love most about gaming peripherals is firstly the performance, but secondly it has to be the appearance. I want my gaming equipment to look like something out of a space ship, or something unique that other gaming peripheral companies have never created. Just so inside you know, that your stuff looks epic. And the Sentinel Advance II has done just this. Its a plastic build with a gun metal surrounding around the bottom of the mouse, with its crafted curves to fit your hand perfectly. On top you have a black grill with a bright coloured LED shining through which instantly grabs your attention, and in-between it you have a OLED screen. Yes, thats right. An OLED screen which shows you your profile and your DPI Settings and not just that, you can attach your clan logo inside of the OLED screen to make it YOUR gaming mouse.
You can change profile and DPI settings with a simple click of a button (which is located at the front of the mouse, out of the way.), if you want to change your DPI settings without touching your profile their are two buttons next to the LCD screen which lets you do just this. On the side of the Sentinel Advance II you have a 3rd button and a TX button which allows you to create 9 extra virtual buttons, you do this by pressing the TX button and any other button on the mouse to create a custom macro or simple attack. BOOM. You then obviously have the scroller which in my opinion is a bit clunky but you get use to it after a few hours use.
The design really compliments the comfortability of the mouse, take in mind its a large mouse which actually lets you rest your hand on it, instead of moving a tiny mouse around with your fingers. I was playing for hours with this gaming mouse and i felt no tention on my hand what so ever, its ridiculously comfortable and this really does effect your overall gaming experience. The only thing i did realise is that your pinky finger is feeling a bit lonely as he seems to be holding onto the side or dragging along the floor, maybe a slight curve where your pinky could rest would give this mouse a perfect comfortability ranking.
On the bottom of the mouse you have your sensor which isn’t directly in the middle of the mouse, it is slightly higher towards the top of the mouse but still not noticeable at all. Also on the button you have a little door which you open and this unleashes the weight system, you have 5 x 4.5g weights which you can customize to your liking. I liked how Cooler Master placed the weights towards the back of the mouse making you move the mouse with your palm instead of dragging it around with your fingers, and it makes the whole mouse feel more sturdy and less vigilant to breaking. Good call.
Performance
A gaming mouse could like phenomenal , light up and kick ass. But its all about how it performs with all types of games, as it could perform well in MMORPG’s but then suck ass when coming to the fast FPS games. As stated in the specifications you have from 200-8200 DPI which is a wide DPI selection to it should suite everyones needs. Before i tell you how my gaming experience went with this product i shall show you what the software and settings look like for the Sentinel Advance II.
So here you have a massive selection of settings to customise your mouse the way you want it, you have up to 5 profiles to set up which you can instantly change with one click of a button on the mouse, which is possible In-Game while playing. The whole design of its software is very nice, and its easy to use. So overall the settings and software for the gaming mouse is brilliant, a vast selection of settings, and you can also change the LED colours to show individual colours on each part of the mouse. SEXY!
When playing in game i got really attached to the Sentinel Advance II, it took me minutes to get use to where the buttons were, and my DPI settings, in RPG’s for example Guild Wars 2, this performed very well on low DPI settings, from moving your skills around to clicking on the mob very far away, and when moving from PvE to PvP i simply changed profile to a different colour setting and a slightly higher DPI which i found very very useful in game.
When i moved to a more fast paced game such as Call of Duty or Battlefield i stepped up DPI to either 3200 or 8200 DPI and this is where i started noticing a slight difference in my playing style. At 3200 DPI i didn’t really notice it, but its when i wanted to really use speed with my mouse is when knocked it up to 8200 DPI and when using my mouse with a lot of speed i did feel as though the sensor couldn’t really keep up with the speed at times, this may be due to my mousepad but it happened a numerous of times, but i overcame this issue by lowering the DPI slightly. And to be honest, of someone can play at 8200 DPI for a long period of time must have insane skills.
Overall Opinion
Overall i really enjoy using this gaming mouse, the main reasons are due to the fact that, One; its incredibly comfortable and i think these days people really take that for granted when playing games, if its not comfortable your not going to be playing at your full potential, the ergonomic design fits perfectly in my hand and the buttons are extremely easy to get to. I love the fact that you change profile and colour settings in the click of a button and the LCD screen is still blowing my mind. You can play all types of games on the Sentinel Advance II with ease, simply change profile, BAM, your ready to roll, and then you have the TX button for you more professional players who like to set up lots of macros within your mouse.
If your looking for a new gaming mouse that looks bad ass and performs perfectly on all types of games, then i seriously think you should check out the CM Storm Sentinel Advance II.
I hope you enjoyed this review, if you have any questions on Gaming Peripherals hit us up on our Facebook Page or @TechBoomTV on twitter!
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