Corsair Sabre Laser RGB Mouse Review

Overview

 

Hot on the heels of the impressive Corsair Void headset we have the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB (CH-9000090-EU) Mouse, a relatively new mouse from the Corsair Gaming range. This particular example is a right-handed mouse equipped with an 8,200 DPI Laser sensor. The same mouse is also available with the Corsair (sails) branding on it (CH-9000112-EU) and there’s also an optical version (CH-9000056-EU) too!

The Sabre Laser RGB is (somewhat obviously) equipped with 16.8 million colour RGB illumination and eight programmable buttons with Omron switches and is covered with a black soft-touch surface. There’s also a selectable Report Rate and a 1.8M braided cable. The mouse itself measures in at 80mm (W) x 38mm (H) x 124mm (D) and weights in at only 100g, and there is no additional weight management.

 

 

 

The Corsair Sabre Laser RGB arrived at pcG in a small predominately grey/black box with a large image of the Sabre mouse on the front. As you can see from the front of the box; on the left we have Corsair’s new Corsair Gaming logo and on the right Corsair highlights the 8,200 DPI Laser Sensor and the 1.6 million color customizable backlighting. Just below the image of the mouse Corsair also highlights the following:

 

The back of the box has three further images of the Sabre mouse highlighting not only the eight programmable buttons but also the following:

 

 

As you can see the box is equipped with a lid allowing you a sneak peek of the Sabre Laser RGB mouse hiding within. This is always a good feature at least allowing you to eyeball the mouse before you buy! In addition to this on the inside of the lid there’s a also a little more detail of the Sabre’s 16.8 million colour 3-Zone backlighting.

 

 

On opening the box we can see a little (well a lot really!) more of that new Corsair Gaming yellow colour and we can also see that the mouse itself and its associated contents are more that adequately packaged and protected. The mouse itself is held in place within a cardboard tray and by way of a clear plastic blister.

There’s not much in the box though; other than the mouse itself we find a Quick Start Guide, Warranty Guide and a disposal leaflet.

At the time of writing the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB (CH-9000090-EU) Mouse is available from Ebuyer at approximately £40 and comes with a 2 year warranty.

 

Specifications/Features

courtesy of Corsair

 

 

* Additional details available here

 

First Impressions

 

 

First impressions of the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB is that it’s a mouse, much like any other, or is it!? It’s an ergonomic mouse at that and is one that has been designed exclusively for right-handed Gamers and right-handed FPS Gamers if you were to go by what Corsair are suggesting. Straight off the bat though the Sabre looks like a good Gaming mouse, it’s got a nice soft-touch surface and seems to suit my bastardized Claw grip quite well! I say quite because I found that my Middle finger seemed to hang over the edge of the right button somewhat, hmm…

 

Looking at the left side of the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB mouse; let’s first look at its ergonomics. If we look carefully at the image above left we can see the sculpted area for your thumb to rest, above which we find two very well placed thumb buttons. I take my hat of to Corsair for this, as it’s something that so many manufactures get wrong! Of course this is somewhat subjective and will depend on your Grip type. Just forward of this we find the DPI indicator, that supports up to five DPI settings with the LED itself supporting the full 16.8 million colours.

Looking at the right side of the mouse there’s very little to see as the Sabre is not ambidextrous. What we can see again here is the contoured ergonomic design, that specifically caters for Right-handed, FPS, Claw Grip Gamers! We can also appreciate that nice soft-touch surface treatment that covers the main body of the mouse.

 

 

Looking at the front of the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB we can see that it’s actually rather busy looking! I will cover the mouse wheel and the buttons etc when we look at the top of the mouse further down. The area to the right (image above left) that almost looks like a rear diffuser from a car, actually houses 3 LEDs, that shine out of the front of the mouse. These are of course for aesthetic purposes only, although they support 16.8 million colours and can be programmed via the Corsair Utility Engine (CUE) software. To the left of this diffuser we find that attached 1.8m braided cable, although what you cant see here is that the right mouse button is actually shorter than the left to accommodate this, which is kind of weird!

The back of the mouse is dominated by the new Corsair Gaming logo, which I think looks pretty cool, it just takes a little getting used to as we are all used to the ubiquitous Sails logo. The white logo itself supports 16.8 million colour backlighting and is again controlled via the Corsair software. What you can also appreciate from this angle is the Sabre’s right-handed, Claw Grip ergonomics…

 

 

When looking from above there’s plenty to talk about, first I’d like to just highlight the shape; this sees the left mouse button being larger than the right! The net result for my grip (a bastardised Claw Grip) was that my Middle finger would rest right on the edge of the right mouse button; due to its shortness and the angle at which it curves away. Now, working front to back we first come across the two main buttons both utilising Omron switches, offering a nice positive clicking action. In between these two buttons we find a well positioned scroll wheel equipped with a very grippy (bad word!) rubber tyre. The wheel also has well placed and palpable clicks in its scrolling action; in fact I’d give this scroll wheel 10/10! Behind the scroll wheel we have one of the eight programmable buttons, this button by default is setup to do nothing, but can easily be programmed via the Corsair Gaming software. Just to the left of the left button there are an additional two buttons, these buttons by default perform DPI Up/Down functions and are well placed for this purpose.

Rather unusually the bottom of the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB is a little boring looking (and dare I say a little cheap looking too!). It features three large PTFE Glides with a smaller strip under the left mouse button making it four. In the centre we find the 8,200 DPI Laser sensor and a splash of Corsair Gaming yellow for good measure… 😉

 

Hardware Installation

 

 

Testing Methodology/Setup

 

 

The following games were used during testing:

• Star Wars BattleFront (BETA)
• SOMA
• Metal Gear Solid V

 

Hardware Performance

 

At first I found the ergonomics of the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB to be a little weird, despite the fact that this mouse is designed for right-handed, Claw gripping FPS Gamers, of which I’m undeniably one! I found that although my bastardised Claw Grip suited the mouse well enough, my Middle finger seemed to want to rest perilously close to the front edge of the right mouse button!? Over the week or so that I have been using the mouse I did find that I got used to this, but it never really felt right! If you know what I mean… 😉

Ergonomically the rest of the Sabre was pretty much perfect for me, with all of the buttons within easy reach. The two thumb buttons are possibly the best positioned (for me) thumb buttons I have come across. Well done Corsair! You’d be surprised how many manufacturers get this wrong…

My setup for general Gaming (including FPS) saw me using the default 1500DPI setting, I found this to be the perfect blend of speed and control. I also used the top button (behind the scroll wheel) to cycle the various DPIs that I setup. This had the knock on effect of freeing up the to left (Index finger) buttons for other tasks/Macros etc.

From a pure performance point of view the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB performed its duties well. The 8,200 DPI Laser sensor was spot on in tracking in all games whether slow or fast. Admittedly I never actually ventured much beyond 2,000 DPI in game as the mouse just becomes to sensitive for my liking! The Sabre also glided well on its four(ish) PTFE Glides, with no signs of anything catching and with the base of the mouse appearing to be nice and flat also. Overall other than the placement of my Middle finger on the right mouse button, there’s really noting to complain about here. The Sabre is a damn good Gaming mouse with pretty much all of the features you as a Gamer are likely to want.

 

 

As you can see the 16.8 million colour RGB lighting aboard the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB is very impressive. There’s three dedicated Zones that can all be controlled independently. Various effects can also be applied, and each Zone can support a different effect. Also overall colour representation was also very good, with the Sabre Laser RGB being able to produce some of the trickier colours such as white, orange and pink!

 

SOFTWARE

 

 

The Corsair Utility Engine (CUE) software can be downloaded here and comprises of a single application with four main sections. The first section is the Profiles section (everything you do here is effectively assigned to the selected Profile) and by default this brings up the first tab Assignments, here is where you can assign any of those eight programmable buttons. Hover over any of the eight keys and the corresponding button on the mouse is highlighted. Now you can assign an Action, create a new Action, Remap a key, reset to default or even clear it (disable it) should you wish.

The next tab is the Lighting tab, here you can control any of the three main lighting Zones on the Sabre Laser RGB. Each Zone supports 16.8 million colour illumination and also various in built effects such as (Rainbow, Solid Color, Color Shift & Color Pulse). Of course if you not happy with any of these effects you can head over to the main Lighting section and create your own!

The final of the main Profile tabs is the Performance & DPI tab. It here that you will need to come to change your DPI settings, any of the five DPIs can be adjusted in a range of 100 – 8,200 in 100 increments, each DPI level can then be assigned a colour (choosing from 16.8 million colours of course!). In addition to this should you wish to have just three DPIs to choose from, any number of them can be simply disabled. Individual X/Y axis support is here too, as is hardware assistance in the form of Angle Snapping and Enhance Pointer Precision all of which (thankfully) are off by default. Here you can also adjust your Lift Off distance if you’re a bit of a Lifter like me! 😉

 

 

Looking at the other main sections first we come to the Actions section it is here that you can come and create custom Actions that can then be in turn bound to buttons aboard the mouse. An action can be a simple Shortcut or Keystroke, an inbuilt function such as DPI control or something more complex like a custom Macro. As you can see from the image above left I created a simple Cycle DPI Action and bound it in turn to the top button aboard the Sabre.

The next section is somewhat similar; the main Lighting section is where you can come to create your own Lighting profiles! Here you can spend hours creating custom illumination and trust me it’s complex stuff, everything the software caters for is impressive! That is until you find out that you can’t seem to apply any of these newly designed profiles to the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB as it#s currently not supported! 🙁

The final main section is Settings here you’ll find a raft of information regarding not only the mouse but also your system. In fact the section itself is broken down into Device, Program and Support tabs.

All in all the software is impressive, I’d be surprised if you could find something missing that’s for sure! The issue with this of course, is that the software not only looks complex, and at times it is; but you often just find yourself suffering from information overload!

 

Final Thoughts

 

It’s always nice when a product surprises you and the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB has done just that, it’s a damn good Gaming mouse that’s really been designed for Gaming, with a great Laser sensor and well paced programmable buttons. The only oddity being that shortened right mouse button…

The Corsair Sabre Laser RGB (CH-9000090-EU) came to pcG in a small predominately grey/black box, the mouse within and its contents (just paperwork) were both well protected and nicely presented. The mouse itself features an 8,200 DPI Laser sensor, eight programmable buttons and maybe most importantly of all, 16.8 million colour backlighting. The Sabre features three specific lighting Zones, each of which can not only support its own colour, but also its own effect. Although you can also create your own effects these cannot be applied (at this time) to the Sabre Laser RGB, which is shame!

From an aesthetics point of view the Sabre Laser RGB is a good looking mouse, but looking at it from an ergonomic point of view the shape is a little odd! According to Corsair this mouse is for Right-handed, Claw Grip, FPS Gamers (and this description fits me well!); yet although the left and right sides of the mouse feature great ergonomics to support this, the shortened Right mouse button seems too short for its own good. The end result (for me with my bastardised Claw Grip) was that my Middle finger rested on the front edge of the right button, which although fully usable felt weird, and it still feels weird a week later! Now although that’s a moan I have to confess that I still very much like the Sabre and of course my moan is somewhat subjective as it’s based around my Grip type!

Button placement on the Sabre was perfect and I would say that the two thumb buttons (often found to be ill placed) were in the perfect position for my grip. I have to applaud Corsair for this alone as so many other manufacturers get this wrong!

The 16.8 million colour lighting is also impressive with three dedicated lighting Zones for you to customise. I particularly liked the DPI indicator (to the left of the left mouse button) that changes colour depending on what DPI is selected. Of course this can be customised too, with 16.8 million options on offer! 🙂

Performance wise the 8,200 DPI Laser sensor also didn’t disappoint with great tracking and precision in all Games played. There was also no hint of any hardware/software assistance when using the mouse. Although there are a couple of options (Angle Snapping & Enhance Pointer Precision) in the Corsair Utility Engine (CUE) software that relate to this, thankfully they are Off by default and best left that way IMHO!

The software itself seems to support every option a Gamer could ever want, which is good right!? Well yes, but the issue is that because of the rich feature list of the software the screens can look a little intimidating at times! Information overload comes to mind…

Overall the Corsair Sabre Laser RGB is a great Gaming mouse, especially if you’re a right-handed, Claw gripping FPS Gamer! The price (£40 at the time of review) is good, the mouse is good, the tracking is excellent as is the 16.8 million colour lighting. Ok so the software can be a little mind-boggling at times but you don’t need to delve too deep to get at the basics! My only gripe is that shortened Right mouse button, that (for me) doesn’t seem to suit my Claw Grip as well as it might have. But hey, that’s subjective anyway!

 

Verdict

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Many thanks to Corsair for providing this sample for review