Kylie's Ratpadz gives mice one smooth ride

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Product: Ratpadz XT
Website: WWW.RATPADZ.COM
System Requirements: A mouse of any kind
Price: $25 with free shipping in the USA and Canada)

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REVIEWING A MOUSEPAD? While many people, including my editors may think I have lost my mind, I am still going through with it. First of all, I've been using mouse pads for years, and I was quite vocal about the difference in mouse movement ever since the now infamous "shiny vs. cloth" debate appeared back in the mid-90s.

At that time, the optical mouse was belonging in the same region of science as Star Trek and HAL 9000, but Duke Nuk'em and Quake appeared and in multiplayer, all of a sudden, precision became important.

While nut jobs called hardcore gamers started to move to PS/2 ports and overclock 'em to 80Hz or more, the surface dilemma appeared. Cloth of fancy print, which one is better - and all of a sudden, 3M appeared with its so-called Precision Surface and the era of gaming mousepads began.

So, here we are - with undoubtedly one of the most popular mouse surfaces for enthusiasts, Ratpadz in its XT incarnation. This pad is a product produced by our colleague Kylie Bennett - the editor will undoubtedly rename him into Kyle - nothing to do with me, honest - from HardOCP a so-called "enthusiast" web site. Kyle originally started to sell gaming surfaces after people at an unnamed gaming pad company annoyed him. In the end, this product outlived and outselled products from the company that annoyed him, but that's history.

The pad

Ratpadz XT compared with a regular sized CD/DVD media

I do not own the previous incarnations of Ratpadz, so I cannot compare the two, but I have years of experience with "professional mouse surfaces" such as Giganta and fUnc pads.

Backside contains nine pads that keep the XT above ground

XT is a pretty big mousepad, but no larger than an A4 sized piece of paper. Lower part of the mouse features a curve for optional placement of a silicone resting pad so that your arm rests on it. While it may seem odd, I wholeheartedly recommend that you buy the silicone resting pad if you are using a mouse for more than two to three hours a day.

You can remove the pads using your nails, but there is no purpose in doing that

The bottom of the pad contains large "Ratpadz.com" and "made in USA" engraving, and the key sides of the bottom contains nine pads which keep the mouse firmly on the surface. They're glued with industry grade glue, and unless you try to remove them on purpose, they should give you a firm grip for many years to come. We tried and removed one pad using nothing more but a nail.

The manufacturer claims that this mousepad should feel like "greased silk", but trust me, I have more than one silk item and no, it does not. Nor greased silk is the feeling you should be having while working on a computer. My first INQpression of touching the Ratpadz XT was the same as touching the engine intake cover on a Ferrari F430 and F355: the placebo affect of feeling more secure and precise is guaranteed, and sometimes that's all that you need.

The test
In order to compare "performance" of this mousepad, we have placed five different mouse pads under our MX-510 and check the difference in control with three shooters, F.E.A.R: Combat, Quake 4 and Red Orchestra and three regular games: Flight Simulator X, City of Heroes/City of Villains, World of WarCraft.
For testing, we have used our INQTest #1 configuration, consisted out of following components:
Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 @2.93 GHz
Asetek VapoChill Micro
Intel D975XBX2 Bad Axe 2
2GB Corsair Dominator PC2-9136C5
MSI GeForce 8800GTS @575/2000
24" LCD Dell 2407WFP at 1920x1200
OCZ GameXstream 850W
Logitech G15 Keyboard
Logitech MX-510 El Raton / Logitech MX Revolution

Seeing that even speakers now ask for drivers, we were quite happy to learn that there was no need to install any driver - only thing needed to put the mouse on the pad and you're ready to go. We've started first with your regular, one dollar mouse pad, continued with shiny print-out pad and then moved on to Giganta Smoke, fUnc Surface 1030 and of course, Ratpadz XT.

We started testing with Ratpadz, moved to Everglide, fUnc and then glossy-print out and the regular cloth (faithful Abit's king-size mousepad), to see will we feel any difference. On the XT, mouse just slides with zero resistance, and same thing happened with Giganta and fUnc. For both cloth and glossy, a certain amount of force is required. Having said that, you might not want to own a light mouse, since it'll just fly around. In all shooters, I have to say that using sniper was more comfortable and precise on the XT than on fUnc or Giganta. Both cloth and fancy print-out result in less-precise response and the difference in games that require a precise hit to get a one-shot-one-kill, so if shooters are your thing, get a better pad asap. Flight Simulator X did not show any difference between the pads, but then again - if you're using a mouse to fly, you're missing out on a great fun.

In both MMORPGs there was a visible difference in crunch scenes between gaming surfaces and cloth/print-out pads, such as intense PvP battles where both cloth and print-out pads did not shine.

Overall, the Ratpadz feels close to Everglide's Giganta, but somehow we feel that our reference mouse has a bit smoother cruise on the XT than on Giganta. FUnc surfaces come with two different surfaces: Smooth and grainy but to a far less extent than said Ratpadz, and overall it gives a pretty good experience, but the pad is sometimes too small!

In Short
After using Ratpadz XT for several days, I've replaced my rusty fUnc 1030 from my heart. I still use my 1030s for my test rigs, but when I start gaming, gaming rig has Ratpadz under my Rat?n of choice. Kylie did a good job with these babies and I can freely recommend them. If you're a hard-core gamer, XT could be quite an improvement for your gaming experience.

However, if you are a casual gamer, this mouse surface is going to give only a guarantee that a mouse twitch will not happen at critical moment - improving your skills only relies on your training. If you are a day trader, this may make a difference.

Will I use it even with my laptop? The answer is sort of yes. Just like I am carrying around MX Revolution and using it - a shocker for Logitech marketing department - with a notebook. And if you're living in hotels as often as yours truly, you will appreciate a solid ground for your mouse. Glass above polished wood just kills the laser enough for Photoshop, yet alone gaming. ?