Hardware Review: 3DS XL

A couple of weeks ago I obtained the Pikachu edition of the 3DS XL, because I was getting a 3DS and why not, it's cute and I like Pokémon (in fact, the reason I got a 3DS now is because of the Pokémon X/Y announcement). The guy in the store told me they only had one, and in fact they had only ever had one, because apparently it's quite rare and only one was sent to each store (at least in Canada, don't know about the US). 

Anyway, my first impression was that the 3DS is basically the coolest thing ever, so I thought I'd give it a little more time before writing a post, because maybe it's not quite the coolest thing ever and I just hadn't noticed yet. 

Turns out it's not the coolest thing ever, but it is pretty damn cool.

Product Review: SteelSeries Guild Wars 2 Gaming Mouse

Disclaimer #1: I bought this mouse because it was about time to get rid of my 5-year-old behemoth of a wireless laser mouse. I didn't get anything for free, nor did SteelSeries so much as suggest that I do anything. I'm just a guy who bought a mouse and figured he'd write something about it.

Disclaimer #2: I've never reviewed a physical object before, and I've never owned a gaming mouse before. So some of the stuff I go over may seem obvious or standard for a gaming mouse, but whatever, it's my first one. 

All right, with the fine print out of the way, here we go. This is the SteelSeries Guild Wars 2 gaming mouse (available here for $70 US). The GW2 mouse is a slightly stripped-down version of SteelSeries' Sensei mouse, which has a few more features but costs $20 more.

Here are some numbers. I found them on the website, maybe they're important.

Frames per second: 12000
Inches per second: 150
Mega pixels per second: 10.8
Counts per inch: 90 – 5670
Maximum acceleration: 30 G
Sensor data path: True 16 bit
Lift distance: ~2 mm
Maximum polling: 1000 Hz