General Performance
As an everyday mouse, the Hellion feels perfectly at home doing normal navigation tasks. Accuracy in Photoshop was very good and I setup a profile simply for this programme, such was the Hellion's accurate performance, testament to the AVAGO 9500 sensor. It was nice using the ATTACK button to drop the DPI on the fly for doing some very accurate, work and I can see that it could also be used to great effect for those who like to play sniper class in FPS games.
The DPI has a range of 100-5000 however I found anything over 2400 to be a waste as the mouse was so ultra sensitive that the slightest nudge would send the cursor across the screen. Those who have an Eyefinity or Stereo Suround setup with large screens may however find the ultra sensitive nature of high DPI usefull but 99% of the population will likely keep the performance slider and therefore DPI nearer the low end of the DPI settings.
Gaming Performance
First off I loaded up Starcraft II and it was immediately clear that this game defines what the Hellion is all about. The preconfigured macro settings for Attack, SCV, Warp Gate etc were a joy to use one I remembered which action I had assigned to which button and thus made gameplay very natural and fluid. The styling of the mouse is clearly reminiscent of Terran battle armour along with the fonts used which match those in the game. The Attack button that I criticised earlier was actually not too bad in use. It still felt a little clumsy and none precise but it was nonetheless very usefull. I just wish Leetgion had encased the button in a sleeve to make it less wobbly!
For the FPS test I fired up Modern Warfare 3. The Hellion performed very well in this area and I found the Attack button most useful for melee attacks! The additional buttons recessed into hte main mouse buttons were also useful for calling in perks and throwing grenades, saving keyboard controls for the all important straffing.
Durability
Leetgion make some very loud noises about the durability of the mouse and for the most part I would be inclided to agree as the premium switch gear used throughout is excellent and coupled with the cherry MX keyswitch along with stainless steel inserts make the mouse one tough cookie.
I did however come across an issue that left a sour taste in my mouse. Upon closer inspection, I noted that the paintwork had a slight blemish which certainly wasn't there when I first unpacked the mouse. This raises the point of the finish of the plastics. While the plastics used certainly appear durable, the paintwork clearly is not the best on the market. For it to mark after only a few hours of relaxed gameplay does not bode well for long term use. I will concede there were no signs of fading so this may be just a manufacturing defect on our particular sample. I do however suspect that the paint used on the Hellion is a little too brittle and this resulted in the surface becoming scratched when I flipped the mouse over to turn the profile wheel. What may appear to be a minor fault could quickly deteriorate into something major if the paint were to flake away at a later date. Thankfully, at present there were no signs of this happening but as with all our reviews, we like to mention the bad along with the good and the Hellion has many positives which thankfully outweigh the few negatives.
Time to wrap this review up as I give my closing thoughts in the conclusion...