First, a brief intro. This mouse first came out way back in 2009. I was one of the early adopters back then, having bought it as soon as I knew about it like I do with many products. There was not a platform I could voice my reviews on back then like I have now with Mysteryblock Reviews. Now that I do have somewhere to write my thoughts and opinions on the products I try out, I am more willing to revisit some older products and see how well they fare in today’s world.

This does a couple of things for me and for readers:

1. It gives me a chance to look at top-selling products from a few years ago and compare them with today’s tech. It allows me to see what really changed in technology and also find things like price vs. quality with each product.
2. It also lets readers see the value in yesteryear’s tech against the products that are currently on the market.
3. Lastly, it is a very good way to prove the longevity of items. I have mentioned time and again that I am fairly cheap and I love when my hardware lasts me a long time. By giving a second look at the stuff that released years ago, we can identify which companies and/or product lines typically produce the best time-tested material.

I want to end the intro with a little side note as well. Mice typically do not evolve as quickly as other hardware parts (read: CPUs). With each iteration, there is also a lot of repetition. The mice just don’t change that often because there are not many innovative things to add to mice like hardware engineers can add to processing chips.

Mouse Review: Logitech G500

Alright, to the review we go. I started out by giving the old thing a feel. I look at things like, how does it feel playing around with?; is it too heavy or light?; how is the traction against my pad?; how do the buttons feel? Clicky or cheap?

All of these are valid and important questions when giving a first (second) impression on something you will presumably be using for hundreds of hours as you play PC games. The feel, along with the actual technical performance, are the two most important factors in how well I enjoy a mouse.

The G500 keeps the older MX500 mouse base, sticking to the tried and tested form of older, more successful products released by Logitech. I remember enjoying the MX500 for its simple yet comfortable shape. The G500 adds a few tweaks to it, but for the most part, the mouse feels the same.

The difference between the MX and the G500 is the scroll wheel. Logitech decided to implement their new (at the time) hyper-scroll feature on the G500 and marketed the mouse as a middly-priced device, unlike the other mice that also had hyper-scroll. Except the implementation was just terribly done. The click speed is way too fast and it feels off. You may find yourself scrolling down with the middle button so quickly that it seems utterly pointless. In games where switching weapons with the scroll wheel is a thing, the G500 will screw you up. Even turning off hyper-scroll does not do the mouse justice because without it, the wheel just feels so off compared to today’s mice, where one smooth slide of the wheel will scroll it a few times. Those “clicky” mouse wheels are my favorite and the G500 just lacks that feel.

Another bad design were the thumb buttons. I was hesitant to write “buttons” because it honestly feels like you can press all of them at once without even trying, and my thumb seriously is not that big. Other mice from the same era have perfected the thumb buttons and made each distinguishable when pressing. The G500 just fails in that regard and made the three buttons on the left side useless for me.

Performance

Other than the terribly designed exterior, I admittedly do enjoy the other technical features of Logitech’s release. The sensor is quick to pick up all my movements and mouse panning totally feels smooth. At the time, 5700 DPI was very impressive, even beating out a lot of Razer’s equipment in the same price range. Even today, the laser engine is very serviceable and can work for many gamers.

The left- and right- click buttons work perfectly as well, feeling tight with each click. Playing shooter games was enjoyable, panning and clicking smoothly.

To buy or not to buy?

The Logitech G500 was a very popular model back then and it still is being purchased quite frequently as far as I know. However, I just do not see the value in it all these years later when all new technology has come out. The G500 still retails for at least $99.99 at most online outlets, not much cheaper than when it originally came out.
Even after a few modifications and adjustments from Logitech, the mouse still holds many of the problems it had in ’09. The thumb buttons are still shockingly inseparable and the scroll wheel is still a headache to use.