Razer Copperhead - Gaming Mouse Review

Quoted from Razerzone:
"Equipped with speed, precision and sensitivity,
the Razer Copperhead™ brings gaming to new heights with
its revolutionary 2000dpi laser sensor technology.
Add 32KB of onboard memory,
this intelligent mouse is a genre-defining weapon that makes for
penetrating, explosive gameplay."

Razer Copperhead on Razer Mantis Speed

Still using the typical mouse for gaming? I used to, too. I was using a cheapo A4Tech optical mouse, then switched to Creative Optical 3000 800DPI mouse. But it still wasn't fast enough for my daily Counter Strike: Source dosage. Plus, often, the opponents seemed to be able to trigger or zoom faster than I did. I've tried to master the extreme lightning clicking speeds from the village of lightspeed, but to no avail. I was puzzled, so I prayed. So I prayed...to God? Ha! You bet. Yeah right, my almighty god, the gaming device manufacturers!

Creative Optical 3000

At last, my prayers were answered (not all, though) when I came across this fast laser mouse with ultimate precision, the Copperhead. Named after a poisonous snake from Razer, a company known for producing gaming peripherals. The design is ambidextrous, therefore, it is friendly to both lefties and righties.

The mouse design is in such a way that encourages finger control over the traditional "palm-style" control. Meaning you hold and control the mouse with your fingers only instead of laying your whole palm on top of the hull. The perfect curve for finger control will prevent RSI for prolonged usage. I've gamed for more than average of 5 hours per day without feeling any discomfort, as contrary to my Creative 3000, traditional Logitech and other humpback kidney designed mouse.

Razer Copperhead Chaos Green on Razer Mantis Speed mouse mat.

Do we actually need 2000DPI (dots per inch)? The answer is Yes, if you are a high sensitivity gamer (even low sens gamers could reduce the on-the-fly sensitivity and DPI to desired settings) and have a large monitor. A single swipe of your palm will have the mouse pointer reaches left or right easily, as opposed to lower DPI mice where you need to swing left/right, lift up, left/right a couple of times. This is very important in games, especially FPSs (First Person Shooter). Meaning, you are able to look around the environment faster than your enemies, given that they aren't using the same or higher DPI mice (this excludes those low sens swiping freaks, pro or noobs of the like).

Razer Copperhead Front

The Copperhead has 7 buttons altogether. The main left/right buttons, the scroll button, and 2 side buttons on each left and right of the mouse. All the buttons could be set as Macro or assign to other functions. For me, I've only used one of the buttons as on-the-fly sensitivity adjustment. There're a lot of options you could customize in the Razer's advanced driver control which also known as the Razer Synapse Configurator. From polling rates, DPI, windows sensitivity, acceleration to button macros and flashing your firmware.

Copperhead Driver Control (Synapse Configurator)

What's the polling rate anyway? It is the rate at which the mouse sends signals to computer every second. The higher the polling rate, the faster the computer responses to your clicks and movements. The Copperhead is capable of 1000Hz which means 1ms polling rate, as opposed to typical mouse of 125Hz over the USB port. Be warned however, setting the polling rate to 1000Hz requires a little bit of processing power from the CPU. So those with slower CPU cores should consider setting on 500Hz instead. Users reported that they could spot the difference between 125Hz (8ms) to 500Hz (2ms), but there's not much difference between 500hz to 1kHz.

The "On-the_Fly" sensitivity adjustment is a lovely addition, where you could virtually adjust the sensitivity in real time, eg. in games by just pressing a button which you assigned as "on-the-fly" and scroll the wheel up/down to set the sensitivity up/down and vice versa.

On the fly sensitivity status bar will appear on the bottom right of your screen.

A sensitivity level status bar would appear on screen once you triggered the on-the-fly function, showing your current sens level, even in games (if users checked the option in the synapse software). This feature enables me to adjust to the nature of weapons used in games. For example, if I'm sniping off fast moving opponents with a scoped view, I would set my sens higher. Whereas I would lower the sens for high recoil rifles like the AK-47 to compensate for the gun back-kick, which could seriously screw your aim and emptied your clips into the walls and birds (if there're any) instead of your enemies.

Users could adjust the DPI on the fly too, but I prefer to fix it at 2000DPI, as the tracking would be more accurate with higher DPI values. Altering the on-the-fly sensitivity, simply means changing the sens by software/driver offset without nerfing the tracking sensor itself.

Okay, Enough for the DPI tech talks. Accuracy and speed are crucial in games like Counter Strike, the same goes with all FPS games. With the mentioned high sensitivity tracking, I could target/aim opponents faster with minimal finger/palm movements. Granted with the Hyperesponse buttons trademarked from Razer, I find myself able to trigger or zoom faster than before. The results is, of course, higher frag rates. No kidding. The precision from the Class 1 Eye Safe laser sensor is amazing and dead accurate. Even it was noted "eyes-safe" I wouldn't recommend staring at the laser when the mouse is powered on.

Tiny mouse feet, the laser sensor and profile button.

The 32k on board memory can store up to 5 profiles where users could switch between by pressing the profile button at the bottom of the mouse. This is handy when gamers using their own mouse in tournaments where there's no driver installed. All the polling rate, sensitivity and button mappings are stored in the memory.

There're also cosmetic features on this Coppherhead, which includes the blinking razer 3 snakes logo on the back of the shell, which imitates the breathing of a living snake. The Razer Glowpipe non slip side rails which enhances the grip and also illuminates the surroundings, thus gamers could find their mouse in the dark. The scroll wheel has a bright glow too. The copperhead has 3 colors to choose from: Chaos Green, Anarchy Red and Tempest Blue. I chose Green because it is cooler with that acidic look and to match my Razer Mantis mouse mat.

Three colors to choose from: Chaos Green, Anarchy Red & Tempest Blue.

Final Thoughts:

Is this mouse worth your money? Definitely, the copperhead has every aspects an avid gamer would wish to be imbued in a mouse. BUT, yes a big BUT, the Copperhead is not without its problems. Do a quick google and you may discover that a lot of end users complained about the double clicking issues: the button double clicks when you actually did a single click.

Sadly, my Copperhead is inherited with the problem too, even before a year of use. Now both the left and right button double clicks! This is a nightmare for us, FPS gamers, where it made our single shot became double shot and wasted the ammunition (this might be good for run and gun games without recoil). Or worse, became un-scoped where we usually zoom with a single click (double click made the zoom mode became un-zoomed). In windows, it could lead to frustrations since single clicking/highlighting a folder actually opens it or open the item inside, because windows thought you are double clicking!

For the hefty price tag of sub RM200+ in the market, I expected the mouse to be able to withstand my button bashings and longer lasting. It is dissapointing for a great mouse. Apart from a bunch of useful functions, some are just pure marketing gimmicks, where we won't use daily or never will.

Hope Razer could at least improve their QC, maybe just replace the microswitches which powered the mouse buttons. A precise, fast and egornomic mouse hampered by a huge double clicking problem is not worth it.

I'm looking forward to send the Copperhead for RMA. During this period, I might just get myself another gaming mouse...err...from Razer? Hell NO! I have the phobia already. It's going to be the Logitech G9! Stay Tuned till the next mouse updates!