Despite the all-plastic and rubber design, the overall build quality does not suffer and feels really solid in the hands.
Logitech’s long history with gaming peripherals affords them a holistic view of the market, and the freedom to see which of their products worked and why.
The G502 line-up of gaming mice from the company remained one of its best-selling products from 2016 to 2019, and now the company has updated the line-up, making some welcome changes and offering more flexibility. Does the G502X have what it takes to stand up to its legacy? Let’s find out.
Design
The G502’s ergonomic design was one of its most vaunted features, and Logitech was smart not to mess with the winning formula too much.
The first thing you immediately feel when you pick up the wired variant of the mouse is how light it is. Logitech has sacrificed RGB to make this possible, which is a bit of a bummer, especially for gamers who like to sync up rigs.
I would have happily given up a little more weight if it meant that the company could include RGB like the 502X Plus but alas, this isn’t the case here.
The second major thing you will notice is the all-plastic scroll wheel. It doesn’t feel as nice as the metal wheel but it does still have Logitech’s Infinite Scroll, which allows you to rotate the wheel indefinitely to scroll faster.
A welcome change is the ability to now customise the thumb button by either removing it completely or flipping it to suit your needs. This is useful if you find yourself accidentally pressing on while resting your fingers on the side of the mouse. It can also be swapped and replaced with a small stopper that plugs up the gap.
The 502X also has new colour options to choose from, like out white review unit, which looks stunning but there is no getting around it, the white variant will demand more upkeep which is something I think you should have noticed by now in the pictures included.
A major change is the new hybrid switch system for the buttons. Logitech calls them Lightforce Optical-Mechanical switches which claim to offer the feel of mechanical switches with the precision of optical ones.
After using the mouse for this review, I can say this claim is warranted. The mouse buttons are nice and tactile. With each press, you get the reassuring clicks of a mechanical switch, with nearly the same response as an optical switch.
The rubberised feet on the mouse are also a highlight, I never felt restricted in my movements and the mouse felt very smooth on my mousepad. Despite this, when stationery the mouse holds its position very well, which means there are no accidental movement inputs.
The wired variant that we used has a nice long braided cable, along with 13 buttons in total to go crazy with and reprogram to your heart’s content.
There are three buttons by your thumb on the left, two right next to the left mouse button and two buttons in the centre below the scroll wheel beside the left and right buttons and the scroll wheel middle click.
By default, Logitech sets them up for you using a default profile, which for example – uses the left two buttons for going back and forth on a webpage and the two centre buttons for DPI shift but you can completely remap these using Logitech’s G Hub software.
Software
The sleek minimalist presentation of G Hub is something I am a huge fan of. The software itself allows you to customise your mouse to your liking.
It allows you to program and assign macros, and rebind keys to better suit your needs and best of all it allows for per-application profiles. This means you can configure the best settings for a particular game, and they automatically load once you start it.
The software is arranged neatly with everything readable at a glance but offers in-depth detail in each category as you peruse them.
Performance
The Hero 25K sensor can reach up to 25,000 DPI (Dots Per Linear Inch). For the uninitiated, the higher the DPI, the more sensitivity your mouse has.
I have to admit my gaming skills top out at around 16,000 DPI, which was my preferred setting to use through the review, anything higher is a bit too sensitive for my tastes. You can also switch DPI manually at any time if you have it assigned to two buttons on the mouse.
Id Software’s Doom Eternal proved to be a perfect testing ground for the mouse. The game’s frantic action demands a lot from the player and requires that you switch weapons and cycle through your equipment constantly.
With 10 unique weapons and two unique equipment types along with movement abilities such as dashing and double-jumping, that is easier said than done. Normally, it would require I fidget around with key binds until I find a nice balance between the buttons on the keyboard and on the mouse but with 13 buttons at your disposal, it is a cinch.
Being able to switch weapons faster is key in combos such as Ballista shots chaining into Shotgun blasts or a peppering of the ice bomb combining with the Rocket Launcher and the Full Auto mode of the single barrel shotgun.
This mouse made my time much more enjoyable with the game and having the functions all laid out on your mouse, makes it super easy to pull off combos.
Similarly, In a game like Control where there are different psychic abilities, these can all be mapped to the mouse for an easier time.
As for the responsiveness, these buttons feel great and I did not notice any delay between when I press the input and the game registers it. In fact, it performed better than my keyboard which often got caught up with quick commands in sequence.
The mouse is also comfortable to use for extended gaming sessions and I felt no wrist pain or fatigue from using it too long. Since this is a wired mouse, I didn’t need to worry about the battery either.
Conclusion
The Logitech G502X is the perfect gaming accompaniment and the mouse feels like it was built for it. Despite the all-plastic and rubber design, the overall build quality does not suffer and feels really solid in the hands.
Just do yourself a favour and get the black colour variant, as awesome as the white one looks, it is, unfortunately, more prone to show up dust and other blemishes.
The wired variant is priced at Rs 7,995 but you can already find it for as low as Rs 6,650 on Amazon.