Recently I bought this Catz R.A.T 4+ mouse on sale (€25). But I think I overpaid. But lets get to the details.
Terrible software. Startup takes half a minute (using M.2 drive with 3000MB/s transfer, PC with 80GB of RAM and 4-cores CPU). When you "save" settings... it gets frozen for several seconds.
Mouse was created for gamers:
- 👍There is a side "precision" button that decrease sensitivity when pressed. Lucky, it can be re-mapped. If you are playing anything FPS like "quake"or alike - this might be a good option for aiming.
- 👎There is a top-button meant for profile switch. There are 4 profiles - number cannot be changed. The button cannot be remapped. There is no indicator of current profile. The LED "can be adjusted" but only in small range: off or 3 similar brightness levels, red only.
- 👎4 side LED's indicate sensitivity - brightness cannot be adjusted and LED's require you to pick up the mouse and see... No added value at all.
- 👎The "palm rest" can be only moved along a single axis. Not too good.
- 👎No tilt wheel. Maybe not require for a gaming mouse but I love it. Even for gaming.
- 👎No linux drivers.
- 👎At first it feels nice. But after a while I can see how far away it is from the Logitech quality (I love MX Revolution and its variants - even thought it is wireless).
- Large wheel with strong physical feedback. But I cannot tell whether after some time it would be still the same.
- Loud clicky keys. Not a problem but I like silent keys. Loudness similar to my mechanical keyboards.
- 5 side LED bars (I am not sure whether a single LED or multiple) with no purpose.
- Each "profile" is a separate thing so you ned to configure everything for each profile. The profiles would be good if several gamers would be playing using that mouse but otherwise this is an annoying feature, button wasted and over-bloated application. I even like dell alienware's mouse app more.
- Too wide. And no way to adjust its width. I have a large hand but it is just too wide for me. Probably too-too-large for kids.
- Only right-handed
- No rest points for little finger. No button under it either.
- Drivers can be downloaded from a painfully slow and bloated page.
Overall: a disaster.
I'll compare it to a cheap chineese Magic Eagle HV-MS735... which is far superior to catz rat4+. The Magic Eagle is a wired mouse with 12 side keys, tilt wheel, RGB LED's (one under the body, one in the wheel), fully configurable keys, fingers rest, similar quality of cable, drivers CD included and application which sucks but is superior on every side to the catz one.
Now the price. It is a bit bellow €100. In that price segment you have many much better mices. And by adding a few bucks you get top-shelf products. Or you can pay much less but get a legendary product such as Deathadder :)
