SteelSeries Aerox 9 Wireless: MMO Gaming Mouse

The design doesn’t make sense. The side buttons stick together and are hard to push. Don’t recommend.

I bought this directly from steelseries as soon as it was released because I didn’t know if it would be on Amazon and because I like trying just about every MMO mouse out there. I’m always on the hunt to find a better MMO mouse and this one may be my new favorite.

This WoW edition of the Aerox seems to fix most of the problems of the original one. The build quality is far superior. The scroll wheel is tighter and you can feel each deliberate scroll. One of the biggest complaints about the side buttons being hard to press is not the case here. They are a quite a bit easier to press but they still feel like solid button presses that aren’t wobbly like other mmo mice I have tried (Corsair Scimitar Wireless). The plastics used are nicer in both look and feel. It feels like a premium product and the gold looks even nicer in person than in the pictures. The biggest gripe I had about the original aerox and the Corsair Scimitar Wireless was there was always some travel and a very awful scrunch feeling after fully pressing the left/right clicks, this mouse just does not have that at all and I really tried to see if it would. Granted, I’ve only had it a few days so we will see if that scrunch develops later on.

I personally like that it doesn’t have the honey comb body, I was never a fan of them and I don’t notice the 10 gram difference. I thought the W may be annoying on the Palm but it actually feels nice and gives the mouse an interesting but really good grip.

Overall, I really like this mouse. I have tried just about every MMO mouse that’s out there today and have been using them ever since the original razer naga was released. I think this one may be a keeper and one to dethrone my current favorite mouse because it finally has a similar build quality (the razer naga v2 pro, which has its problems but I would still take it over the original Aerox and the Corsair Scimitar Wireless). The ONLY cons this may have is the price and that it’s a Warcraft mouse. But the W looks really nice as does the gold in general and though WoW may not be the game it used to be, I still have very fond memories and nostalgia around it. So, I can put up with the W and just enjoy the premium MMO mouse that the market desperately needed. I definitely need more time with this and will update the review if anything changes, but for now I am really enjoying this mouse.

The Aerox 9 was the latest purchase in my years long attempt to find something better than the Naga. I figured I’d get the WoW edition because I missed the boat with the old SteelSeries WoW Cataclysm edition.

Pros:
Right off the bat, I am impressed with the build quality. It’s a fairly light mouse– lighter than the Razer Naga and the Corsair Scimitar. Glides really nice on a Glorious pad. The texture of the plastic is great; It’s smoother than the Naga but doesn’t have that almost greasy feel the Scimitar does. It’s got decent ergonomics with a few design flaws (more on that in cons). If you liked the grip of the older, more ‘pear-shaped’ Nagas, it’s like that only longer. Good for longer or larger hands except…

Cons:
The buttons. First, placement. The array is quite a bit farther away from the palm rest than on the Naga, which isn’t a problem alone but the button array is also very very low on the side. Meaning your thumb is gonna be pressed hard against your desk for you to be able to click any button in the bottom row without fat fingering. Speaking of clicking, there isn’t any. I’ve tried the Naga, the G600, and the Scimitar, and this mouse has, by far, the worst feeling button actuation out of all of them. They’re stiff, comparatively hard to actuate, and give pathetically soft feedback when pressed. Just awful. At least they are beveled unlike the Scimitar so you have a better time of knowing which button you’re on when doing your rotation.

Since Nagas are notorious for breaking, the Aerox 9 will make a nice emergency spare mouse, and the fact it happens to be a WoW edition will make it a good collector’s piece. I would recommend this to those who have big hands with chimp strength, but again, the position of the button array on this thing kind of defeats the whole purpose. Not worth the purchase unless you are a Blizzard collector with a hole burning in your pocket.