Patriot Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad Review

Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad – A Closer Look

The Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad has a polymer surface that is very smooth and soft to the touch. This isn’t the typical gritty feeling hard surface pad you are used to, this pad is very smooth and allows for easy gliding of any mouse. I am not generally a fan of hard surfaces, but the one on the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad is adequate. Unfortunately, it isn’t quite wide (13.9″ at the widest point, but tapered down) or tall (9.5″, a bit more concerning than the 13.9″ width) enough for my liking, as I found myself running off of the edges of the mouse pad on rare occasions.

The bottom being tapered inward from the top is a bit awkward, since it causes you to run out of room as you move the mouse down. It didn’t take long to get used to the shape and feel of the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad and within fifteen to twenty minutes, it felt very natural to game on. I was very impressed with how nicely my Logitech G903 LightSpeed felt and tracked on the pad, especially given my typical reservations about hard surface mouse pads. While I am not going to get rid of my cloth mouse pad anytime soon, the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad did have me reconsidering my stance on hard surface mouse pads and I may be keen to try them out more in the future.

The Viper logo takes up the upper right hand corner of the mouse pad and is the most visible LED lighting portion of the mouse pad. The Viper logo has been integrated nicely on the Gaming LED Mouse Pad, with kind of a 80’s arcade gaming throwback feel (in a good way).

The bottom area of the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad has a durable rubber base with a nice gripping texture that keeps it from slipping from whichever surface it has been placed on. The Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad is very rigid and has a solid overall build quality and the rubber base meets the rest of the mouse pad well, with no loose areas or build quality issues apparent.

The LED lighting on the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad is provided by a ring that houses the LED lights. The LED lighting ring sits between the rubber base and outer edge of the mouse pad surface, which means that the ring is only visible from the bottom of the pad and provides an edge lit effect, which contrasts with the directly visible LED rings on the Corsair, Razer and SteelSeries RGB mousepad offerings. The LED ring is integrated very nicely with the mouse pad and everything sits and fits well together.

The Micro USB input for the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad was done right, with a very low profile that integrates very nicely with the mouse pad, in an unobtrusive fashion. I use a wireless mouse for testing, but the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad cable is low profile and it should be easy to keep your mouse cable managed with a bungee when using the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad.

The included USB cable includes a built-in control box that allows users to control the various lighting effects on the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad. SW1 (Mode1) sets the mode between multi-color, cyan, yellow, green, teal, blue or pink. SW2 (Mode2) sets one of the seven different lighting modes, which are breathe, gradient radar (clockwise), gradient, gradient radar (counter-clockwise), gradient breathe, static and off.

The static lighting put out by the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad is uniform and vibrant, though I do wish the effect were more pronounced. The under glow provided by the Viper does look good on reflective surfaces, though.

The different color modes provided by the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad are basic, but enough to let you coordinate with your peripherals to some degree. The red LED mode on the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad matched up pretty well with the red LED output on my Logitech G903 mouse and the pair looked decent together.

I really like how the LED effects look on the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad, but I just can’t help but think a more visible lighting ring would look better. The animations aren’t as smooth as I’ve seen in other LED products, but they are still pretty darn good. These pictures get a more optimal view of the lighting than you get in person from a top down view, since they capture the mouse pad from the side. The effects look good in person, they are just a bit understated and dependent on the surface the mouse pad is on.

The polymer surface of the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad worked better than I expected and actually had me enjoying a hard mouse surface, something I have never been able to do. For hours I was able to game on the Patriot Gaming LED Mouse Pad, when I swore I wouldn’t be able to when I first got it. I kind of want Patriot to just offer a non-LED version of this mouse pad, because it’s that good as a standalone surface. I do wish the LED lighting ring was top facing and that the usable mouse surface was just a bit bigger, but other than that, I don’t have any complaints.

Overall, the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad is a solid, enjoyable to use mouse pad with some cool lighting effects that are simple to set. My Logitech G903 and G703 both worked very well on the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad and while I can’t comment on cable-interference, the low profile of the USB connection does seem like it would lead to a lot less interference than the connections we see on the Razer and Corsair RGB mouse pads. For users who just want a simple mouse pad configuration with cool lighting effects, the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad fits the bill.

Let’s wrap this review up and see where the Viper Gaming LED Mouse Pad stands against the competition.