Asus crafted an ambidextrous RGB mouse with swappable Omron switches

The plight of the left-handed gamer is that peripheral makers tend to heavily favor their right-handed brethren. Every so often, an ambidextrous design emerges in the world of gaming mice, though according to Asus, they're mostly crap designs (we're liberally paraphrasing here) that often result in accidental button clicks. With that in mind, Asus and its ROG division just announced the Pugio, a better designed ambidextrous rodent.

As far as Asus is concerned, what makes the Pugio superior to other ambidextrous mice is the use of magnetic side buttons (though the same feature can be found on Logitech's G900). Rather than accidentally clicking on a side button that you're not used to dealing with (or being distracted by them when they're disabled), you can remove the buttons on either side of the Pugio and replace them with covers. You can also choose between two or four buttons on either side.

That is the primary selling point of the Pugio, though it offers more than just removable side buttons. It is equipped with a 7,200 DPI optical sensor and uses Omron D2FC-F-K switches (made in China) that are rated for 50 million clicks. It also comes with additional Omron D2F-01F switches (made in Japan) that you can swap out if desired, and is compatible with several others to suit your preference—just remove four screws on the bottom of the rodent, pull back the cover, and yank out the switches. There is a pretty decent guide on the different Omron switch types here.

There is a DPI switch to toggle between two preset sensitivity levels, along with a separate button to lower the actuation force and travel distance required for each click. And of course the Pugio sports customizable RGB lighting.

The Asus ROG Pugio releases to retail today and costs $90.

Paul Lilly

Paul has been playing PC games and raking his knuckles on computer hardware since the Commodore 64. He does not have any tattoos, but thinks it would be cool to get one that reads LOAD"*",8,1. In his off time, he rides motorcycles and wrestles alligators (only one of those is true).