Cooler Master Sentinel Advance mouse review - Behold the Sentinel

Behold the Sentinel

So then, first we'll have a look at some of the features the mouse offers, and then on the next pages we'll look into a nice photo-shoot, followed by a test and sure, I'm feeling generous today... I'll throw in a conclusion as well ;)

The Sentinel Advance will be available within a couple of weeks for around 60EUR / 69 USD. This mouse apparently has been two years in the making, the first professional grade gaming mouse from the CM Storm series.

Most prominent features:

• Gaming-Grade Double Laser Engine
• Onboard Memory
• Switch and Go Multi-Profiles
• True Hardware dpi selection
• Adjustable Weight
• Extensive Software
• Monochrome OLED screen

So (and I'm using bits and pieces from the press-release here) the CM Storm Labs Sentinel Advance is fully enhanced with Storm Tactics, providing Strength, Security, and Control to the user. Um yeah, that's marketing at its best. It boils down to a 5600 DPI Storm Sensor that uses twin lasers, Doppler Effect processing, and real-time tracking technology (as opposed to software prediction), and all that for the most accurate headshots alright ;)

The one thing that must be said is that the Sentinel Advance offers a complex and wide variety of control over the settings and functionality of the mouse, and Cooler Master did that really well. Sensitivity ranges, rapid fire modes, macros, and scripts can be edited through a graphical user interface and saved to five different profiles in the internal memory of the mouse. We'll look into the software suite later on in this article though.

With a freaking 5600 DPI mouse it makes sense to use DPI adjustments, and obviously button controlled DPI switching has been introduced into the mouse so you can trigger DPI on the mouse itself.

Next marketing phrase... oh dear, I can hardly even pronounce it: Octoshade LED Technology(!)

Okay, so the mouse allows you to modify LED colors and light effects and bind them to your profiles. Fun stuff.

More fun is of course the the little OLED screen, which just looks too damn cool. The little single color OLED screen allows tiny customized clan logos to be uploaded and displayed directly on the mouse itself, tiny though... you have 42 pixels available for this. We've already mentioned this in the introduction, much like most gaming mice these days the Sentinel Advance also has a weight system, which lets you fine-tune the total weight of your mouse in increments of 4.5 grams, with an effective range of 0-22.5 grams.

Inside the mouse is also a little ASIC, it contains 64kb internal firmware ROM to store all your settings, the advantage here is that if you use the mouse on another system, you still have your profiles and setup available.

Let's have a looksie at the mouseeeh...