We haven’t reviewed any mice in awhile, so I’m pretty excited about this HyperX Pulsefire Core. From the sleek lines of the mouse to the white packaging, looks pretty slick, but we need to find out, does it perform?
UPDATE 5/12/2020: Lighting effects NOT saved with onboard memory. MUST use NGenuity software.
The HyperX Pulsefire Core is an entry-level gaming mouse with RGB accents and braided cable, retailing for about 30 US dollars, 25 pounds, 40 Canadian rubles, or 990NT here in Taiwan, with a 2 year warranty. We’ll throw the link here for the HyperX Allow Core RGB gaming keyboard they occasionally bundle with it on Amazon, feel free to check that link and c’mon back for the rest of this review when you’re done.
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HyperX Pulsefire Core’s symmetrical design, nice matte finish
The symmetrical design of the HyperX Pulsefire Core has a top coated with a nice matte paint, which feels great and provides decent grip. Top buttons provide a tactile click with nominal pressure, and the 1000 hertz polling rate is performed by a PixArt 3327 which is a great sensor, generations after the 3320 and 3325, bringing near high-end performance to the entry level segment.
Measuring 120 millimeters long by 64 wide and 42 mils high, it’s suited for claw or palm grip with medium to larger hands, and as I have larger hands, I find it fits really nicely. The lift-off distance is roughly 2 millimeters from the pad until it loses tracking.
The PixArt 33-27 tracks 6200 DPI or dots per inch, and handles 220 IPS or Inches per second, which converts to just over 5.5 meters a second, and up to 30G, yes, G-force, plenty fast for gaming. When gaming mice starting getting bench-marked, these values represented the upper limit when the sensors lose the ability to track movement properly, now they’re pretty much beyond what a normal human could do.
If you’ve gamed with an old mouse, you’ll know you hit that limit when moving it quickly side to side actually moved the cursor less than moving it slowly the same amount of distance. Perfect control Speed is the value at which the mouse would appear to spin-out in game, but we absolutely could not reach the Pulsefire’s limit. Very good.
HyperX Pulsefire Core’s scroll, DPI, grip
The HyperX Pulsefire Core scroll wheel area is glossy, and the wheel has a rubber outer ring, which provides super silent scrolling. The wheel click is straight down only, and is pretty quiet too.
DPI buttons are also here, with similar click characteristics. Side buttons on the left only, and are glossy plastic, with a higher pitched click, but with the same amount of pressure. They are positioned well and fit my hand shape naturally, and are both easy to reach.
The opposite side has the same wavy textured grooving which does a decent job of providing grip, though if you get moist hands while gaming, it may be a little slippery. Or you could see a doctor about that. Conversely, wash your hands before gaming and grab a few dollar-towels from IKEA and you should be good to go. The bottom has great large skates, which really glide across mouse pads.
The HyperX Pulsefire Core build quality is super solid
And onto the build quality for the HyperX Pulsefire Core, and we were not disappointed here, it’s super solid. flex sounds It’s actually really surprising how extremely well put together this mouse is, not a creak or sound other than buttons for several months already. Super stiff with no flex or rattling, everything’s machined perfectly. Buttons stay in place with zero play, it’s quite surprising for such a budget-oriented gaming mouse.
Weighing in at 93 grams with cable tug included, the mouse has good balance and distributed weight. It’s lightweight but almost into our self-defined middleweight category, which we call 95 to 110 grams, heavyweight being 110 grams and above.
Competitive pro gamers often choose lighter mice, and from long play sessions I can confirm that heavy mice tire out your hand quicker than light ones. That being said, I’ve played over 6 hours a time on Borderlands 3 without any fatigue with this mouse.
Response on the HyperX Pulsefire Core is nice and fast
Response on the HyperX Pulsefire Core for clicks is nice and fast, HyperX is using gaming grade switches rated for around 20 million clicks. Higher tier, expensive pro gaming mice may be marginally faster, shaving off 2 to 4 milliseconds, but with milliseconds we’re talking about thousands-of-a-second. Gaming, I found the Pulsefire Core to be a very competent mouse, and considering this comes in at just under 30 bucks, it’s pretty amazing performance nonetheless.
This is all controlled with HyperX’s NGenuity software, it’s a Microsoft Store download of 72 megs, which downloaded and installed quickly. It recognized the Pulsefire Core, and allows you to change the values and colors of each DPI level down to 200 or anywhere in between. Changing DPI up or down sends windows messages informing you of the new value, but they stack and display slowly, probably a windows messaging issue, but hopefully HyperX can tune this a bit in the future.
Polling rate default is the maximum 1000 hertz, and you can adjust it to 125, 250 or 500 in software. One good feature of Ngenuity is the ability to reprogram all mouse buttons except left and right to whatever you want, including macros. In the March 2020 Beta version we tested, for the main left and right buttons you could just swap their functions.
By clicking the icon picture top right, you get access to profile options which you can assign to games, and the Pulsefire Core will automatically switch between them when launched. In addition, the mouse appears to have onboard memory saving settings, as I switched PCs and everything stayed the same.
And let’s talk about the RGB logo. There are four settings, solid color, a breathing mode, color cycle, and a trigger that lights up reacting to button presses. You can really dial in the exact shade you want with the color wheel. There’s also an off mode, if you need it to go stealth.
The software is still beta, but something we noticed is the default slow color cycle setting pretty well matches the keyboard, but when you launch Ngenuity beta software, suddenly it goes 4 times faster. It also remains this speed minimized, until you actually exit the software. It’s a quirk but if you set the RGB and exit out, it works fine, so hopefully HyperX can fix this in the final software.
The HyperX Pulsefire Core RGB is exceptionally well built
The HyperX Pulsefire Core is an exceptionally well built gaming mouse, with a bunch of customization so you can tailor your setup for winning. With quiet mouse wheel with a nice scroll, precise left and right buttons, side buttons that are very well machined, and the PixArt sensor which is responsive, this mouse has everything you need for just 30 bucks.
We really liked the complete feeling of control and preciseness the Pulsefire Core provides, with all the features it offers. The options for DPI control and polling rate in software along with RGB, 5 programmable and 2 swap-able buttons and braided cord are really amazing coming on an entry-level gaming mouse, and there’s on-board memory to save your profile, offering exceptional value for consumers.
This HyperX Pulsefire Core delivers all the features gamers are looking for. If you’re an e-tournament pro-gamer, you might be looking a tier or two up for something to shave off a millisecond or two, but even as a casual to pretty competitive player, this mouse will serve you very well, and is a great investment into getting better scores.
We always strive to be as objective as possible, and while our testing and conclusion is based on what we saw, you should always go to the store if possible to test mice to see if it will fit your hand and work with your playstyle. That being said, this is super well built mouse that’s terrific for gaming.
The Pulsefire Core has all the features you want for gaming at a real steal of a price. HyperX has a winner on their hands, and it’s great that you can get a performance mouse like this for so cheap. This is definitely the top mouse we’ve tested in this price range, and still holds its own against more expensive options. We recommend this mouse, and if you want to grab your own, buying through our affiliate links down below does help support us here with no extra cost to you.
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