User’s Review: The Razer Nostromo

In The Beginning

I admit, I’m a heavy mouse user through and through and I barely know all keyboard shorts cuts and I hate the Ctrl+ something acrobatics, that in my opinion should not be called short cuts in the first place, after all, aren’t short cuts suppose to be just one press and then WAALAAH? Though ironicaly, I can program my keyboard’s F buttons for that, but that will change much of the default function which is a complete hassle.  The bottom line is I do a lot of work and play on my PC, roughly about 15 hours a day more or less, this put a lot of strain on my right index finger with all that clicking and pressing the keys, though not painful it does give me a pause for concern, I think Index finger stress should be the proper term if there is any and I’m sure I’m not the only one bothered by it. Also there is this particular work that I’m doing that forces me to utilized shortcut keys or hotkeys to speed up productivity.  This means my lift hand is doing some good old hand split that rival the latest Jean-Claude Van Damme commercial.  With this said I set my goal, and look for a product that solve the stress finger dilemma and the apparent finger split routine, that among other things. At first I tried to look in to programmable keyboards, specialized keyboards that has extra key on the left side of the peripheral, either programmable or pre-program with the basic keyboard shortcuts and can instantly access multimedia programs from my PC and the list goes on. And so, my search began there were many options but none stand out as much as the Razer Nostromo. So, I got one a few months ago, use it ever since and this is my user’s review for the Razer Nostromo. Its a great pc game controller that doesn’t limit on games alone but can actually help me in my work.

Razer Nostromo Specs

Ergonomic form factor and tournament-grade layout
16 fully programmable keys
Programmable 8-way directional thumb pad and scroll wheel
Instantaneous switching between 8 key maps
Unlimited macro lengths
Stores up to 20 different game profiles
Adjustable soft-touch wrist pad for exceptional comfort
Backlit keypad and scroll wheel for total control even in dark conditions
Enhanced Razer configurator software
Dimensions (approx) 184(L) x 160(W) x 59(H) mm
Weight (approx) 250 grms

User Review: My Razer Nostromo
Originally developed by Belkin, the Razer Nostromo is a Gaming Keypad that marries the regular keyboard Function keys with your regular mouse plus a Joy stick to boot with a choose all you like setting and best of all its super cool looking.  Gaming Keypads aren’t new concept in the computer peripherals arena, some just call it gamepad pc, pc game controllers. Anyway, Belkin came up with this cool looking device that promises to give more fun in gaming. The PC game controllers has a simple concept, that is to cut the red tape and get away with the finger splits on your keyboard that usually happens when I do my work or when I play. As to how a Belkin product became Razer’s is anybodies guess. Anyway, everything in this, now Razer Nostromo is programmable via Razer Synapse, what this means is that I can download the Synapse to any PC or laptop via net, login to my profile and I’m set to go.

As I’ve said earlier I got my Razer Nostromo a few months ago and I’ve been using it ever since. The Razer Nostromo is a great add-on to your personal computer experience be it mobile laptop or just your PC. In my case it filled the need and cutting down the finger splitting routine to zero it also relieve the stress on my right index finger, since I’m a heavy mouse clicker to begin with when I do my work or play, I solved it by just simply copying the all the mouse function to my Nostromo. This is truly certified thumbs up equipment.

Comfort and Design

The ergonomic design allows comfortable use. This allows my hand to rest smoothly with the nostromo’s soft-touch wrist pad that can be adjusted according to personal preference, though there’s only 2 adjustable settings.  The key can easily be press without any radical movement on my part. Another unique feature of the Nostromo which I find very useful is the scroll wheel, similar to a scroll wheel on your regular mouse though with the Nostromo it can be program to do other things. I can understand why the next generation razer keypads don’t have it, since scroll wheels in general isn’t necessary in gaming. But since I don’t just use my Nostromo for just gaming I find the added feature exceptionally delightful to use and I use it often. Like a joystick there is also an 8 way directional thumb pad that can be program to a specific action and the backlit gave it that cool look on dim environment though it should be noted that there is only one color for the back light.

Programmable

As I mention earlier everything in the Razer Nostromo that can be press, scroll and push is programmable, with 20 game or work profiles and 8 key maps per profile. That allow any user almost unlimited possibilities from simple setting to a more complex macro configuration in gaming. This thing gets the job right and proper.

Probable Issues
For a start I haven’t meet any serious issue with my Nostromo, not in a physical sense. Though admittedly at first, being new to it I have an issue with the slow response from moving to one keymap to another. Which I found later was the result of a bad USB extension and promptly solved it by plugging the Nostromo directly to my PC.  Another issue I have with the Nostromo is not on the Nostromo itself but on the synapse set-up program that controls my Nostromo’s action. Each profile has 8 keymaps, the Issue I have with this is that the Razer synapse only has 2 settings, which are the switch and the cycle. The switch works by setting a particular key to a keymap, that keymap can be any of the 8 keymaps within a single profile or to another profile. With the Nostromo this presents a little problem particularly in heavy gamer who set everything up in one keymap as there might not be enough keys to go around. Of course, this varies between individual preferences and may not be much of an issue to others. The second setting is the cycle, this works by moving up and down the keymaps by sequence. The problem with this is that if your on keymap number 5 and want to go to keymap 1 you need to go through keymaps 6,7 and 8 if you set it to downward cycle. Again to some people this may not be an issue, but would it be nice to have a 3^rd setting for keymaps? Like a keymap activation setting? That way if you have a profile for a certain work or play you can go through the activated keymaps instead of going through the whole keymaps including the inactive ones and combining both in a single keymap sounds a bit complicated since the whole point of a keymap is to cut to the red tape, again just probably be a matter of personal preference.

Ergo

Having a Razer Nostromo is one of the best investment I ever had when it comes to PC peripherals it solve my finger stress worries, made my work more productively and it made my playing experience more fun than the usual. And despite the issues I have with it, I’m sure other users have none. With that I Give the Razer Nostromo a thumbs up.