Roccat Savu Mouse Review

Main Characteristics

The Savu is distinctive by being a gaming-grade mouse with only a few programmable buttons. They are essentially four (the two main buttons, plus the left side ones) and three programmable functions on the scroll wheel (it’s possible to reprogram the scroll up, scroll down and the pressing of the wheel itself). To increase the number of configuration options without including more physical buttons, the Easy-Shift[+] technology virtually doubles the number of programmable functions when button 5 (on the left side) is pressed at the same time with another button or the scroll wheel. (It’s just like the Shift key on the keyboard.) There’s also the Easy-Aim feature that automatically changes the resolution in the middle of the game, which we’ll talk about later.

Figure 7: Button configuration

The excellent software from Roccat handles the entire configuration. The interface is elegant and intuitive, well-conceived and easy to use. It’s possible to create five profiles, to control the illumination, and to choose one of the four pre-fixed levels of resolution (400, 800, 1,600 and 4,000 dpi). For those who cringe when faced with the task of creating a macro, the Savu comes with a package of pre-configured macros for popular games like World of Warcraft and Battlefield Bad Company 2, plus assorted applications like Firefox and Photoshop. Starting from those, the user can tweak the macros to better suit other games, like changing the Battlefield Bad Company 2 macro to work on the newer Battlefield 3 (which we used on this review).

Figure 8: Macro configuration

The program also has a fun feature called R.A.D. (Roccat Achievements Display), which essentially unlocks achievements (just like a game) related to the use of the Savu (for instance, the number of uses of the Easy-Aim and Easy-Shift[+] features). It doesn’t affect the overall performance from either the user or the peripheral, but it’s fun to know the total distance travelled by the mouse.

Figure 9: R.A.D. System