[Hardware] Glorious PC Gaming Race Model D- Ultralight RGB Gaming Mouse

[_Happy boy]

 

Those who have been living under a rock for the past few years might not be as familiar with Glorious PC Gaming Race, so here's a quick refresher. As we'll refer to them from now on, they are a bit of the smaller guys who have made a huge impact in the PC peripheral space since stepping onto the scene in 2014. They've gone on to make what is one of the most recognizable gaming mice with the Model O, an amazing ambidextrous gaming mouse that caters to the ultralight enthusiast. Their goal was to bring affordable enthusiast-grade gear to the market, and so far, they've nailed it. Today we'll be looking at the new Glorious Model D-, an ergonomic take on their iconic design with RGB flare and more to go along with it. Did they nail it?

Glorious Model D-: Bright and Light
The Glorious Model D- markets itself as a slightly smaller version of the Model D, so if you've got a bit larger hands, you might want to go that route, but both will share the same characteristics otherwise. Favoring somewhere between a palm grip and claw grip, the ergonomic shape is limited entirely to right-handed users. Featuring Glorious' Ascended Cord, you'll find this one so amazing lightweight you'll forget you're tethered.The packaging of the Glories Model D- is pretty solid, thick cardboard and a presentation that is reminiscent of the NVIDIA Founders Edition boxes where the top slides off to review a good look at the mouse itself. All the extra goodies are hidden under the bottom plastic mold and include a quick start guide, a trove of stickers, and an extra set of skates, which is a welcome addition for any enthusiast mouse.

The left and right buttons on the Model D- are by Omron and rated for 20 million clicks. While optical-mechanical switches are becoming more common by the big guys in the market, these Omron switches are no slouches. They have a good solid tactile click, aren't too heavy to where you'll wear your fingers out in an MMO but not so light you'll misfire in that heated shooter match.

The scroll wheel is excellent on this mouse, very smooth yet clearly felt when hitting a new step. Comfortable to grip while in-game thanks to the rubber coating's need notches and are flanked by nice soft RGB lighting. The side navigation buttons are often left to just whatever switches are found lying about, but not here as they're just as satisfying to click as the main left and right mouse buttons, nice work on those.For the sensor, Glorious went for the PixArt PMW-3360 with a rated DPI up to 12,000 but comes pre-programmed with 4 steps through the DPI button found in between the mouse buttons; 400, 800, 1600, and 3200. You can remap it but need to install the software to do so; the software isn't required for the plug and plays operation. Throughout about 10 hours of playing Cyberpunk 2077, I never felt any hiccups with the mouse, the game itself is a bit of a different story.

The Glorious Model D- is quite the package I didn't expect it to be. Usually, I expect the smaller outfits like Glorious to let their packaging quality slide to help on margins, and they did not. I expect to find some areas that lack polish, and I did not. There isn't much that I can complain about here because the Model D- delivers on every possible angle they sell it on, except one. The only thing I can complain about is that my pinky has a bit of trouble gripping the mouse when I need to lift it. Normal navigation is ultra-comfortable, but when I have to lift, I lose grip on it. Thankfully Glorious has grip tape for the Model D and D- incoming, and I'll be first in line to get me some of that grippy goodness because it's the only thing keeping this from being my daily driver at this point.

*Note on purchasing, buy direct as resell site seem to be marking up this mouse unnecessarily.