The Cougar Attack X3 Mechanical Keyboard & 450M Gaming Mouse Review
by E. Fylladitakis on April 4, 2016 8:00 AM EST
Cougar is a German manufacturer of PC components that was founded in 2007. The company originally focused on cases and PSUs, but recently diversified towards gaming peripherals as well. A year ago we had a look at their first and, at the time, the most advanced keyboard and mouse they had to offer. Following the success of their 700-series peripherals, Cougar released nearly a dozen additional keyboards and mice during this past year, designed to cover many tastes and budgets. Today we are having a look at one of their newest keyboards and mice, the Attack X3 mechanical gaming keyboard and the 450M optical gaming mouse respectively.
The Attack X3 keyboard and the 450M mouse are targeted at what Cougar considers the "average gamer" class, trying to offer appropriate gaming functionality and high quality at a competitive price. The two devices we're looking at today aren't strictly a bundle, but within Cougar's product lineup they are practically complementary goods for the market segment Cougar is after.
Of all the peripherals we look at, those meant for the "average gamer" are perhaps the most interesting. Unlike flagship products where pricing is rarely a concern and virtually every feature can be (and is) added, for products aimed at the mass market manufacturers need to balance functionality and design with the needs of the market, and ultimately cost concerns. I dare say that having a restriction of some kind forces manufacturers to be more creative, as rather than simply adding the most bells and whistles they need to do proper research and put some real thought into what they're building if they're going to be successful in the mass market. Trying to strike a delicate balance between functionality, quality, features and price is not an easy task; manufacturers have to make sure they provide what buyers will consider the essential gaming features without creating an overpriced final product.
That brings us to today's review of Cougar's Attack X3 keyboard and 450M mouse. While these aren't budget-priced parts - the keyboard is still $80 or so - for gaming peripherals these are mid-range products, or at least a lot closer to it than the twice as expensive 700 series. The 700 series products were very well designed and built, and if Cougar can maintain this level of quality with the X3 and M450, then they should have a winner on their hands. To that end we will be thoroughly examining the advantages and disadvantages of the Attack X3 mechanical keyboard and the 450M optical gaming mouse, evaluate their quality, test their performance and assess their value.
Cougar Attack X3 Mechanical Keyboard - Key features and specifications
- Cougar UIX System
- Cherry MX Mechanical Switch
- Aluminum brushed structure
- N-Key Rollover in USB Mode
- 1 kHz Polling Rate
- Full key backlight
- Dedicated Media keys
- Non-slip rubber foot
- Braided cable & golden-plated connectors
Cougar 450M Gaming Mouse - Key features and specifications
- Omron Micro Switches
- Braided Cable
- Ergonomic Ambidextrous Design
- 3-Stage DPI LED Display
- On-the-fly DPI Tuning
- Gaming Grade Scroll Wheel
- 2 Side buttons (on each side)
- Multi-Color Backlight
- 32-Bit ARM processor / 512KB On-Board Memory
- 5000 DPI Optical Sensor
- Eight programmable buttons
- Anti-Slip Flanks
- Cougar UIX system
- Braided cable & golden-plated USB plug
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BrokenCrayons - Monday, April 4, 2016 - link
Cougar Attack X3...heh, someone in the marketing department has a warped sense of humor...a very, very warped sense of humor. I'm surprised that wasn't caught by someone before their products went on sale.Murloc - Monday, April 4, 2016 - link
I don't get what they should have caught, is it something about "X3"?Because regardless of other references, a cougar is a predatory animal that attacks, so it's a coherent naming scheme.
xchaotic - Tuesday, April 5, 2016 - link
A very quick google search on these dangerous animals got me: "Three Dangerous Cougars Snack On Some Sausage" You must be from another planet Murloc.inighthawki - Wednesday, April 6, 2016 - link
Your results must just be influenced by your web history then. No combination of this product's name gives me anything other than what I'd expect."Cougar" and "Cougar attack" both bring up results related to the actual animal, and any combination of the two with "X3" show only results related to this product, and nothing else.
Kepe - Monday, April 4, 2016 - link
Does someone really use the mouse with their left hand? Especially someone who plays games? I'm as left-handed as a person can be, but I've always used the mouse with my right hand. I tried using my left for that when I was a kid and I never could get used to it, thankfully. Using the mouse with the left hand would also cause all kinds of difficulties with gaming. You'd basically have to re-map every single game's keyboard controls to fit you. Some games don't allow that (crappy console ports). Also, almost all proper (gaming) mice are designed to fit the contours of the right hand, so your mouse selection would be quite thin..DanNeely - Monday, April 4, 2016 - link
I do. I can use a mouse right handed just well enough to use a computer with desktop applications without screwing around with the layout; but don't have the speed or fine control needed to play any game much more complicated than Angry Birds well.I rarely remap keys though; moving the keyboard to the right so that I can comfortably use the left half with my right hand is generally the path of least resistance. The general exception is games that use WASD for movement + surrounding keys for stuff. I rarely play that sort of game; but when I do generally end up with arrows for movement and all the stuff keys either mapped to ctrl-alt-shift-enter or some of the 12 extra buttons on my Razer Naga mouse.
mr_tawan - Monday, April 4, 2016 - link
A couple of guys I used to work with uses mouse with their left hand. They are all right handed.I don't really know the reason. I guessed they are trained to do so in the past company. They used to work with a Bank, which required people to key a lot of numbers.
bigboxes - Monday, April 4, 2016 - link
I was thinking that the only reason a right handed person used a mouse with their left hand is because they are keying (ten key) in numbers.Ukyo - Tuesday, April 5, 2016 - link
Yes that's the reason for most including me. I'm in finance so that should explain it... lolnikon133 - Monday, April 4, 2016 - link
I'm left-handed and always game with left hand on mouse... but I do use right hand for office work. I think I'm doing my left hand a favor - resting it a bit from the same position/grip. I'm guessing your lefties ex-colleagues might be doing the same?With that being said... my right hand did get quite better with mouse control, originally I'd still swap mouse when working in Corel/Photoshop as I was missing accuracy... but not anymore. So I could probably try gaming with right hand as well. At this stage, I do re-map everything, and such a pain in the... lower back it is. I usually use numeric 4568 keys for movement, and then remap other commands around that. I have created some "standards" that work fairly good for me - Num 0 is always reload, for example... right and down arrow keys are jump/jetpac and crouch/prone... Num Enter is Use/Open door... etc.