If you use a mouse for gaming, optimising your system and in-game settings is critical to ensuring maximum control, precision and performance potential. This quick guide walks Windows users through the basics to ensure you have your bases covered.
Optimise your Windows mouse settings
While most modern games use direct or raw mouse input (rather than Windows mouse sensitivity settings), it's worth checking/tweaking your Windows settings to ensure they are optimised for gaming.
To ensure your system settings are correct in Windows, either:
a. go to your 'Control Panel', then select 'Hardware and Sound', then select 'Mouse' (under Device and Printers), then 'Pointer Options', or;
b. click your Windows/Start button in the bottom left of the screen, then the 'Settings' gear wheel immediately above the 'power' icon. In the Settings screen select 'Devices', then 'Mouse', the 'Additional Mouse Options', then 'Pointer Options'.
Here you want to do two things:
1. Set the 'Pointer Speed' under 'Motion' to the middle (sixth) notch.
2. Make sure 'Enhance Pointer Precision' is OFF.
Pointer precision is often referred to as mouse 'acceleration' - which isn't an entirely accurate description, regardless it can reduce your in-game control and precision because it moves your pointer inconsistently relative to the speed and motion of moving the mouse. When in-game you always want consistent movement relative to the movement of your mouse.
Dots per inch (DPI): What it is and why it matters...
What is DPI?
DPI is an often underappreciated factor for gamers, but if you care about performance you need to care about DPI. DPI essentially means how many dots/pixels you move on screen for every inch (2.54cm) you move your mouse. So if for example your DPI is 400, for every inch you move the mouse, your cursor will move 400 dots/pixels on screen.
Why does it matter?
The higher your mouse DPI, the further your mouse moves on screen relative to your mouse movement. From a speed and responsiveness perspective this is an important factor for your game settings and even more so for influencing how your gameplay 'feels'. However, while a higher DPI is often better, higher isn't always better. For example your preferred DPI in a first person shooter (FPS) game may be lower than in a role playing game (RPG).
From a well-being and injury prevention perspective, higher DPI=lower wrist/hand movements=lower probability for injury like repetitive strain injury (RSI). We'll explore wider ergonomics and gaming in other posts, but from a simple 'hands, wrist and, shoulder well-being' perspective, DPI settings can be a useful tool to customise to support your performance and importantly, ongoing playing comfort.
What's your DPI?
Your mouse has a default DPI (a quick Google search should tell you yours), but most gaming mice allow you to adjust the DPI setting through software that comes with your mouse or that can be downloaded from the manufacturer's website. This software usually allows you to configure DPI and other settings like button configuration, polling rates, creating mouse profiles for different games, and changing settings for other peripherals like keyboard, back-lighting etc.
Gaming mouse software like the above from Logitech allows you to customise your DPI and a range of other settings.
So what DPI should you use?
The short answer is 'whatever is best for you'. But the longer (and more helpful) answer is this depends primarily on three things:
1. The type of game you're playing. As mentioned above, different games will better suit lower or higher DPI.
2. Your preference, playing style and what feels comfortable.
3. Your in-game mouse sensitivity settings. Note: When combining these with your DPI setting, it gives you what some call an 'effective DPI' (EDPI). So for example, 800 DPI x mouse sensitivity in-game of 1.2 = EDPI of 960.
Research indicates most professional gamers currently use between 400-800 DPI for FPS games and between 800-2000 DPI for RPG games. There is no set rule though and its a topic of substantial debate amongst gamers. As with other settings topics, draw on the experience of fellow gamers, but go with the option best for you.
Polling Rate: What it is and why it matters
What is it?
Polling rate is the Hertz (Hz) speed your mouse regularly reports it's position back to the computer. Think of it like the connection speed/lag between mouse and computer.
Why does it matter?
This used to be a more relevant factor for older machines where higher polling rates were more rare and could impact CPU load. Most modern mice, especially gaming mice however render this problem obsolete and have polling rates of either 500HZ or 1000Hz.
Polling Rate Delay in Milliseconds (MS)
1000Hz 1ms
500Hz 2ms
250Hz 4ms
125Hz 8ms
If you don't have even an entry level gaming mouse, it's worth checking to ensure you have a mouse with at least 500Hz. If your mouse polling rate is lower than this, this could be one of the relatively cheapest performance bottlenecks for you to fix with a decent gaming mouse.
As with DPI, there is plenty of debate between 500Hz and 1000Hz being the optimal. For most people, the difference between 500Hz and 1000Hz isn't noticeable and again it comes down to personal preference and in-game 'feel'.
Game settings and mouse software settings
The final piece of the puzzle is configuring your mouse software and in-game mouse settings to maximise both your enjoyment of each game, and your performance potential.
Applying what we have covered about DPI and polling rate, this is where you can really personalise and refine your settings to precision.
It's worth noting that each game is different in terms of how it feels and responds from a mouse settings perspective, so it's important to invest the time to get your settings right to ensure you get the most out of your gameplay and optimise your performance potential.
In-game settings can make all the difference, don't miss the opportunity to optimise them!
Taking the time to configure your settings to get the perfect balance for you between your mouse settings and in-game mouse settings can take a little time to tweak and test but it is well worth the investment of time.
The take-away: A decent gaming mouse + optimised gaming mouse settings + optimised in-game mouse settings = optimised mouse performance potential.