Patriot Viper V551 Optical RGB Gaming Mouse Review

The mouse is arguably one of the greatest inventions for the PC and Mac that everyone uses.  With that, newer, bigger and better mice and mouse designs come out on a regular basis and this review is on one of them.  Today I bring you my review of the Patriot Viper V551 Optical RGB Gaming Mouse and the Viper Large Size Gaming Mouse Pad.

So let’s get into the Specs and Features.

Features and Specifications

• Omrom switch
  • 10 Million Click Lifespan
• 12,000 DPI Pixart 3327 Optical gaming Sensor
• 30G Maximum Acceleration
• 220 ips (inches per second)
• 1000 Hz Polling rate
• 5 Memory Profiles
• 8 buttons, 7 of which programmable
• Fully customizable
• Multi-Zone RGB Lighting
• 1.8m braided cable
• Large PTFE glide pads
• Side Rubber grips
• USB Type A
• 2 Year Warranty

Pretty basic stuff I would say but let’s check out an unboxing and see what’s in the box.

As you can see in the picture, you can see it came with a manual

There’s not much to go over here, System Requirements, Overview, Setup and Software installation and configuration all of which we will go over here.  Let’s get to the mouse though.

Starting from the USB connection itself, it is a gold-plated connection.  Coming up from that:

We find a tightly braided cable and in between that a ferrite core to help keep your mouse communication from getting interference, keep that 1000hz polling rate fresh.  Not uncommon, but still worth mentioning.  The cable is 1.8 meters long, or 5.9 feet.

At the end of the cable, we get to the Patriot Viper v551 Optical RGB Gaming Mouse.  There is a lot going on here.

Here, we are seeing a few things that we will go into more detail on in a bit.  We can see the scroll wheel itself, then the left mouse button, the forward and back side buttons and then we can see another button.  This button initially has no function, you give it purpose, as I said, we will go over it soon.

Below that, we see what looks like 2 buttons, but they are indicator lights.  Next to the lights, we can see the side rubber grip pads to help keep the Patriot Viper V551 Optical RGB Gaming Mouse comfy in your hand after a few hours of gaming.

Along the top again we find the scroll which has a firm roll.  Behind that, we find the M key, the M key by default when pushed changes between the 5 saved and pre-defined profiles.  Behind the M key, we find the DPI selector key, which as the name implies, allows you to change between the 5 DPI pre-defined selection and then the good ol’ right button.

You can see here the key to the left of the left mouse button, that is the functional key, just below that there are 3 lights.  The light to the right is part of the over all mouse light, but the front 2 serve a different purpose.  You can see in the 4 pictures above, there are 4 modes.  Each of those modes let’s you know which DPI you are using, this as I mentioned above you can change by using the button just behind the M key.  These are the indicator lights I mentioned earlier.

Each of these keys, Profiles and DPI’s can be changed within the Patriot Viper Gaming Mouse software.

The right side of the Patriot Viper V551 Optical RGB Gaming Mouse doesn’t have the rubberized grip, but it does have a slight indentation.  The indentation helps your pinky and ring finger find a home while you are using this mouse.

Along the back, a simple Viper logo, but this is an LED lit logo which of course we will go over in a bit.

Along the bottom, we can can see the 4 large PTFE glide pads, the optical sensor and the honey comb design, reminds me of the suit in Crysis.

Here we get a little closer look at the label on the bottom of the mouse.  This label provides the model number, series, power specifications, serial number and certificates, nothing major here but of course I wanted to show it to you.

While the Patriot Viper V551 does not come with a mouse pad, the Viper Large Size Gaming Mouse Pad was sent with it to me to review along side.  This mouse pad comes in at 17.7 inches in length and 12.6inches in width, not the largest mouse pad I have used, but it is nice.  I really do like large mouse pads like this, with regular ones I always feel like I am running out of room.

Back to the mouse though, let’s get into the Specs and Features.

Continue: Viper Gaming Mouse Software and features

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The Viper Gaming Mouse Software is the software that controls the Patriot Viper V551 Gaming Mouse.  The mouse itself will work perfectly fine without it, but if you want to change a few things, you will need to install it.

You can find the software here: https://www.viper.patriotmemory.com/viperv551gamingmouse

Let’s check it out.

After installing the Viper Gaming Mouse Software and starting it up, we are greeted with this screen.  The buttons screen allows you set all the mouse buttons the way you like, and even allows you to setup 5 different profiles to have a profile for every users or game you like.

You can also change the color of the profiles, making it a little more personal.

For an example on how we can program a key, I hovered the cursor over the “Forward” button, which highlights the button you will be changing.

Clicking on the text, brings up the function section in which we have a ton of other options.  The “Mouse Functions” area allows you to utilize pre-made functions.

The “Keyboard Functions” section, allows you to set a desired keyboard key for that button, a single key.  A very odd function, but its there if you like it.

The “Advanced Functions” section, allows you to set some other pre-made functions, but these are a bit more advanced than the others.  I like these options, here you can undo changes, adjust DPI, Lock Axis, Sniper function and more.  Sniper function is pretty cool, it allows you to use the regular DPI speed you set your mouse to, then click and hold the Sniper function to reduce the DPI to a more precise speed and let go when you want your higher DPI.

The “Macros” section allows you to create, modify, import and Export many macro settings.  You can get very intricate with these macro settings.  Don’t worry, I will go over them in more detail towards the end of this section.

The “Key Cycle” section to me is a but pointless, but its there.  You can add a few different keys and then have then played back in a “Cycle”, “Reverse” plays the character you entered when you press the selected key.  For example, if you press the key it presses the Number 4, press the key again, it presses A, press again and it types the Number 5 and so on, as you can see in the sequence above.  “Current Position” will start off at the last key pressed.

Again, I am not sure why this one exists, but it does and surely someone will utilize it.  If you know of a reason for it, please do let me know if the comments below.

Coming out of the “Buttons” section (yes, everything until now has been in the “Buttons” section), we move onto the “Sensor”.  Here you can change the preset DPI settings.  You can also set the auto Speed and “X / Y axis independent” settings.  Auto speed, allows you to automatically adjust the DPI in the range you setup according to the mouse movement speeds.  The X / Y Axis independent function, allows you to these different DPI values for the X or Y axis’.

We have already gone over the “Macro Editor” section during the Buttons section, as they tie into each other, so we will skip to the “Settings” section.

The “Settings” section, allows you to change the USB Polling Rate”.  Most would leave it at 1000Hz, but you can go as low as 125Hz if you prefer.

Under General options, you can enable or disable “Angle Snapping”, “Enable DPI / profile OSD” and “Disable mouse acceleration (OS)”

Angle snapping, when enabled helps to move the cursor in horizontal or vertical straight lines, keeping each movement snapped into the nearest angle.

Enable DPI / Profiles (OSD) works with the settings under Buttons”

Notice how there is “Profile 1” ~ “Profile 5”, when you click on the M key, you change between profile automatically.  If this is checked or enabled, the next “Profile” OSD (On Screen Display) will show on the screen, for example.

If you tap what is currently known as the DPI loop button (the button behind the M button) as the DPI loop button you will see this

This shows you change into the current DPI setting.  You can toggle this off so that your don’t see this but I think its great to know what you are getting yourself into.

Disable Mouse Acceleration (OS) to me is a great one to leave with a check in it, to disable mouse acceleration.  While its good to accelerate your mouse, it makes mouse movements distances increase when the mouse if moved quickly, rather than keep the mouse at the consistent DPI you have selected.  If you find the motion awkward, I recommend placing a check in this box, it may help your movements.

When I first started using the Patriot Viper V551 Optical RGB Gaming Mouse, I was going to give it a horrible review until I found this check box.  With it enabled, all my movements felt very erratic, placing a check here made everything smooth.

This setting was not a problem, I could change it and it was easy….

There is a part here that bugs me, but I will discuss that in my “Final Thoughts and Conclusion”

Driver settings allows you to “BACKUP”, “RESTORE” and “RESET” your “VIPER GAMING MOUSE” software.  I have used all quite a few times, and the backup and restore functions are for the previous complaint… but I feel like it’s a hassle to update/reinstall if you don’t need to.  Reset, if you messed up a setting, or changed something and forgot what the original settings was, click here and it will revert back to the initial settings.

Lastly, on the top right-hand corner, when you click on the gradient globe, you can change lighting effects.  Even though we have not talked about it much during this review, this is an RGB mouse after all.

“Customize” allows you to change each of the 9 zones colors to which ever color you would like and also allow you to have then set to “Breathe” or “Always ON”

“Wave”, “Wave (Invert)”, “Random 1”, “Random 2” allows you to set all of the 9 points to in change colors in sync.

So aside from explaining everything through text, for those that prefer video, I got you covered.  In this video we go over all of the settings, check it out.

OK, now that we have gone over all of that, let’s check out my “Final Thoughts and Conclusion”.

Continue: Final Thoughts and Conclusion

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I have reviewed quite a few mice, a few from Patriot as well.  Logitech and HyperX have usually made my favorite mice but it seems like Patriot took the prize here.

The quality of the mice is great, it feels very solid in my hands and has a great set of features, the software did annoy me at one point though, it is a small thing, but it bugs me.

The information section located in the “Settings” screen.  It’s great to have information, but you can’t do anything with it.  It tells you the model, Driver version, firmware version, Pin number then let’s you know where to get updates and support.  That’s still great, but then when we got to the site, that’s where the problem is.  I will get into this in the “Final Thoughts and Conclusion” section.

Here is the site drilled down to the mouse itself… When I click on “ENGLISH” under “SOFTWARE” it downloads the software.  The problem is that nowhere does it tell me what version the software is and there is no update button inside of the Patriot Gaming Software to check for and download the latest version.  You have to come here once a month (an arbitrary date I gave it) to download the software and reinstall in hope that maybe this is a new version that might fix an issue.

I have not run into ANY issues with this software, it is perfect, so I am not saying to download a newer version because there is an issue, but you get what I mean.  If you are going to tell people to go somewhere to get a newer version or to check if there is a newer version of the software, provide information so that they can compare their versions with the site’s version, a simple request I would say.

Aside from an annoyance, it is perfect, so lets go over the pros and cons.

Pros

• LED-Lit
• Offers 9 RGB full spectrum zones of lighting
• 7 Programmable buttons
• Strong build Quality
• Very Comfortable and Familiar feel
• Viper Gaming Mouse software is good
• Very high DPI Resolution
• VERY Affordable
• Nice loud Omron switches

Cons

• No Apple Software Support
• Low button counts for the Macro/MMO crowd

The mouse is VERY comfortable and being that it just felt comfortable, there was no adjustment period.  It has all of what you would want in a mouse, other than maybe a ton of macro buttons and support for Apple machines, software wise at least, the mouse itself will function as a basic mouse within iOS.  It has all the features I would want in a mouse, though the highest DPI is a bit high for me, but I know many would love it.

Check out my review overview to see much of what I have gone over here, you can find the video over here

I really do like Patriot Viper V551 Optical RGB Gaming Mouse, it is a great mouse and even though I was a little annoyed at how it performed with “Disable mouse acceleration” unchecked, it is an easy thing to change, and even some may like it with it on.  The part that got me was the fact that there was no update button in the software and no way on their website to verify if the version you had installed was the latest.  I have communicated this to Patriot and if changed, I will change this to 100%.

Great job Patriot, you earned yourself an Editors Choice 9.9 out of 10 with the Patriot Viper V551 Optical RGB Gaming Mouse

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