ROCCAT Kone Pro Air

[pzogel]

The Kone Pro Air is ROCCAT's first wireless Kone. Much like its wired sibling, it comes with PixArt's PAW3370 sensor, optical main button switches, and pure PTFE feet. At just 73 g, the Kone Pro Air is exceptionally light, and features both 2.4 GHz and Bluetooth connectivity, with more than 100 hours of battery life.

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[Tardian]

• No wireless extender included
• RGB lighting wrecks polling stability in wireless (2.4 GHz) mode
• All polling rates except for 1000 Hz are broken in wired mode
• ROCCAT Swarm causes FPS drops on my system

The dongle should be plugged into a USB 2.0 port for good reasons. The RGB lighting is unnecessary bling: fashion not form. All polling rates except for 1000 Hz are broken in wired mode ... wtf?
ROCCAT Swarm causes FPS drops on my system ... does not sound promising.

Thanks but no thanks.

 

[Fungi]

The mouse getting a recommendation despite these ridiculous cons is pretty questionable. It's not the same shape but at this price you probably want to be looking at the G Pro X Superlight?

 

[AsRock]

For $129 surly they could of added more buttons, although i cannot see me buying another ROCCAT item for some time yet they just kepted asking me to RMA shit back ( over $50 in shipping costs ) to them for them to send me yet another faulty item and once the warranty ran out basically it's out of warranty we cannot help you. So yeah they can go screw some other poor soul.

 

[Cr4zy]

Been using one of these for the last few months. Can't fault my copy. Never had swarm cause FPS issues for myself and also don't use my mouse in wired to worry about that issue. Battery life has been great and usually does most of a week.
Have the mouse for the shape and it's lovely.

 

[pzogel]

The mouse getting a recommendation despite these ridiculous cons is pretty questionable. It's not the same shape but at this price you probably want to be looking at the G Pro X Superlight?

Most of these cons don't apply in a lot of cases, which is why I've decided to go with the Recommended.

Polling rates other than 1000 Hz being broken in wired mode is hardly meanigful, 99% of people will be using the mouse in 2.4 GHz mode, and those who don't likely opt for 1000 Hz anyway. Swarm may only interact negatively with my system, and one can simply terminate Swarm at any time if it does. The wireless extender issue can be remedied by a $5 investment. The big one is the polling instability with RGB enabled, though unless AIMO is used, polling stability is at least decent enough, and without RGB, it is flawless. The GPX doesn't even have RGB to begin with.

I agree though, there are plenty of excellent alternatives around this price point not suffering from issues like these, as pointed out in the last paragraph.

 

[Vayra86]

A hundred and thirty dollars for a mouse with that many problems is just horrible and damages the brand name if you ask me.

Clearly directed at gullible people who like lighting before quality and have no idea of what money means. You can get similar 'performance' for 40-60 dollars.

 

[archagon]

@pzogel, you mention in the review that the 100h battery life is over 2.4GHz, but the Amazon page for the mouse says it's over Bluetooth: "With RGB off and in Bluetooth mode the Kone Pro Air will achieve 100+ hours of battery life." (Roccat's official website does not specify either way.) Can you clarify which one it is? Was this a mistake in the review?

(For the record, my mouse lasted almost exactly 7 days of heavy use over 2.4GHz with RGB off, and about 6 days with RGB on. But I didn't measure the exact number of hours: maybe 8-10 of continuous motion per day?)

 

[pzogel]

@pzogel, you mention in the review that the 100h battery life is over 2.4GHz, but the Amazon page for the mouse says it's over Bluetooth: "With RGB off and in Bluetooth mode the Kone Pro Air will achieve 100+ hours of battery life." (Roccat's official website does not specify either way.) Can you clarify which one it is? Was this a mistake in the review?

(For the record, my mouse lasted almost exactly 7 days of heavy use over 2.4GHz with RGB off, and about 6 days with RGB on. But I didn't measure the exact number of hours: maybe 8-10 of continuous motion per day?)

That number came straight from ROCCAT, and they noted that marketing indeed got that part wrong.

 

[Tanatos7]

RGB lighting wrecks polling stability in wireless (2.4 GHz) mode
Does this problem still exist?

 

[pzogel]

RGB lighting wrecks polling stability in wireless (2.4 GHz) mode
Does this problem still exist?

Unfortunately it does.

 

[Cutechri]

For $129 surly they could of added more buttons, although i cannot see me buying another ROCCAT item for some time yet they just kepted asking me to RMA shit back ( over $50 in shipping costs ) to them for them to send me yet another faulty item and once the warranty ran out basically it's out of warranty we cannot help you. So yeah they can go screw some other poor soul.

I used to have a "membranical" ROCCAT keyboard. It was SO bad for the price. My ROG Strix Flare, while being significantly more expensive, is also significantly better.

 

[Telstar]

Why didn't you test in Bluetooth mode? I heard in another review that it performs well and maybe it's not negatively impacted from the RGB.

 

[pzogel]

Why didn't you test in Bluetooth mode? I heard in another review that it performs well and maybe it's not negatively impacted from the RGB.

Bluetooth maxes out at 133 Hz, so even 2.4 GHz with issues performs better by several magnitudes than flawless Bluetooth. BT isn't any different on the KPA than on any other BT-SIG compliant device.

 

[jfe]

Did you found out why would Roccat Swarm cause fps problems? I ask because I bought this mouse like month ago and from this time I had big problems with games like CS2 to work smooth.
Like at the start of the games everything was fine but after like 15-30min there would be big spikes and stuttering that I couldn't play anymore. I was using the newest version of drivers.
Yesterday I found topic about Roccat Swarm so after that I uninstalled software + change mouse to my old one and seems like right now there is no such a problems.

 

[pzogel]

Did you found out why would Roccat Swarm cause fps problems? I ask because I bought this mouse like month ago and from this time I had big problems with games like CS2 to work smooth.
Like at the start of the games everything was fine but after like 15-30min there would be big spikes and stuttering that I couldn't play anymore. I was using the newest version of drivers.
Yesterday I found topic about Roccat Swarm so after that I uninstalled software + change mouse to my old one and seems like right now there is no such a problems.

Swarm is just bad I'm afraid, not much that can be done about that. ROCCAT is aware of the issues but not willing or able to fix them.

 

[jfe]

I have possibility to refund my mouse so I think I will do it. Thanks for answer