Roccat Kone
Many dedicated gamers have been waiting for Roccats’ high-end gaming mouse since 2007 but after some fruitful delays, Roccat presented their very own ‘Roccat Kone’.
The ‘Roccat Kone’ is a right handed laser mouse for precision gamers, stylish and sexy for the fashionable, well equipped and functional for the technical.
It bares a maximal sample rate of 3200 dpi and you can even switch between dpi levels with the touch of a button in front of the mouse wheel as well as reduced ‘pick-up flight’ meaning the sensor stops responding the instant you lift the mouse which of course means you won’t randomly spin around when you’re trying to reposition your mouse on the mouse mat. A precise deadly weapon when placed in the right hands.
Although design opinions are subjective, it’s hard to deny how great this mouse looks. It has a sleek dynamic design with no awkward angles and/or strange protuberances – thankfully. It has five LED’s all of which can emit every colour of the spectrum individually, fully customisable with multiple colours and effects, rotating, moving, pulsating, blining or heartbeat. This is one mouse out of so many where you can hold or pose and actually be proud of.
You can even adjust the weight of the mouse accordingly from the one of four weights given to you (5g, 10g, 15g, and 20g). It’s easy to fit too; there is socket on the base of the mouse where you can simple slot your weight in, and then the driver detects the currently selected weight and is displayed on the screen. However, if you wish not to use any weights then you are left with an open socket, exposing an empty hole which feels slightly uncomfortable. Nevertheless, the ability fine tune the mouse allows you to make it become an extension of your own body for technical perfectionists.

Needless to say, the Roccat Kone is an unbelievably good mouse; Roccat aimed high and achieved high. Although some minor improvements can be made, it doesn’t seem much of a problem considering the functionality of the mouse. There are 10 buttons, easily customisable, well placed and essentially comfortable. The Kone is considered a pain free experience and it doesn’t seem any different so far. All in all, the Roccat Kone has anything necessary you need in a mouse.

(Technical Specification)
- True 3200dpi laser sensor
- TCU – Tracking Control Unit
- 1ms response time; 1000Hz polling rate
- 16-bit data channel; 7080fps; 6.4 megapixel, 20g acceleration
- 72MHz TurboCore processor unit
- 128kB memory, update-/flashable
- 1.65m/s(65 inch per second)
- Extended USB cable, cable diameter: 3mm


Roccat Taito
Every good mouse needs a good mousemat for it to glide across. The Roccat Taito works magnificently with the Kone, or any top spec mouse in fact. Refraining from all the marketing linger, the Taito is simply a cloth mouse pad with a smooth shiny black surface measuring 400×320mm (15.7 x 12.5 in) and 3.45mm (.13 in) in thickness. The pads’ underneath is a supportive rubber which surprisingly, holds the mouse mat down to the surface very well prevents the pad from moving even slightly even when you’re rigorously moving the mouse – perfect for aggressive players. The surface is smooth and the mouse glides across the mouse pad like a hot knife through butter. The only concern worth mentioning is the packaging; the pad comes in a plastic blister pack which you have to cut open, meaning travelling gamers will not have any form of container for the mouse pad. Besides that, the pad itself is just the right size, comfortable and stylish. This is definitely a great asset to have for quick nimble precise gamers.


Roccat Valo
After 2 years in development, Roccat finally present us with ‘Roccat Valo’. A high quality gaming keyboard equipped with illuminated keys, a mini LCD, two MiByte internal memory, an additional USB port, media keys as well as a deactivation feature which lets you deactivate certain keys which could potentially interrupt your game – a handy feature for everyone, especially on a clumsy day.
More impressively, Valo offers 41 macro keys that can be assigned up to 500 keystrokes, and a additional option to colour map individual keys to red and light / dark blue instead of the original keys, which can all be stored in 5 different profiles and 4 different sub-profiles known as layers. This on-the-go macro system is actually surprisingly easy to do and very to get used to. Although this may sound a little daunting for casual gamers, hardcore gaming fans will be happy with the huge variety and accessibility – once you get used to it, which won’t be long, you’ll abuse the system.
The design minimalistic but still slick and stylish, no fussy extensions and strange pointless keys getting in the way. After a while you get so used to it, it’s almost as if you’re using a holographic keyboard, but in reality it’s just a quiet stylishly simple Valo sitting on your desk.
Roccat have kept it simple to an extent, and sometimes that is the way to go. Improved essentials are definitely and ultimately more important than adding countless functions and at a 100 Euro’s the price is more than justified. This a keyboard which you will find yourself falling in love with more and more, the more time you spend with it. The Valo is a valuable peripheral with hidden potential which cannot be seen on its shell.

(Technical Specification)
- Standard keyboard layout with 105 keys
- 48 additional keys plus 7 media hotkeys
- 5 profiles incl. 1 Profile-2-Go
- 2MB internal memory, updateable, flashable
- Stereo 3.5mm audio input and output sockets
- Additional USB 1.1 port