Summary
The Deathadder Chroma is at first glance a purely superficial LED upgrade to a well established product. However the internals have been upgraded. 10000 CPI is now available, and even 6400CPI seems to work with more accuracy. The USB polling also seems to be unexpectedly better although ROG still seems to hold a slight lead on this.
However is not known if the sensors optical resolution is truly capable of a 10000 CPI or if the chip itself is interpolating a 6400CPI signal to give a 10000CPI output. All we know from Razer is that the 10000CPI comes out of the hardware and is not generated in software. This is irrelevant for most users for now. Few if any users actually want to use native 10000CPI yet. Even with my 3x4K monitors and my sensitive RSI troubled wrists found that 6400CPI is really my sweetspot. I do believe that until 8K becomes the norm that 6400CPI is all that’s really necessary. However as we saw the Chroma did give better 6400CPI performance than the old 2013 deathadder so perhaps even though 10000 CPI itself may currently be a waste, the sensor upgrade may not be a waste overall.
For CPI’s lower than 6400 CPI the Gladius does seem to perform better, however it has a known weakness with it’s scroll wheel (ours like many others broke within a year of light use). On the other hand I have three deathadders all of different generations that have been abused for a long time and none have had any issues. Therefore if the Deathadder Chroma’s shape and feature set line up with what you want then I have no hesitation in recommending it. It is even further improved when upgraded with Hyperglide feet. As it’s currently the best mouse that I’ve personally tested then I feel it deserves the coveted Extreme Rigs Gold award.
Where to buy: Newegg – $60, Amazon – $60
