Mionix Propus 380

YEAH, I KNOW, it’s a mousemat. How much time can you spend looking for a mousemat? After all, you can get away with just using the top of a desk if you so desire. But I’m the kinda guy who pursues the finer details. I like a system to be perfect, a desktop to be perfect. And if it’s not, it’ll frustrate me until it is.

It’s not something we test often, and with good reason—the two we have, the Razer Firefly and, more recently, Corsair’s Polaris MM800, are gaudy affairs of RGB LED death made manifest. Overpriced, and laden with cables and additional nonsense that just isn’t necessary. That said, I am a massive fan of hard mats. Ever since I saw the first aluminum pads in 2013, I wanted one.

Upgrading from my SteelSeries cloth affair, I invested in a Mionix Ensis 320. It was beautiful. My mouse glided across it with ease. However, after a year, it looked as if it’d been involved in a car crash. With the paint stripping away, it was useless. Then I joined MaximumPC, and began searching for another. After finding In-Win’s BatMat, I thought I was saved. But again, I had problems. This time with grit, and as it grated on the surface, it sent chills down my spine.

The Mionix Propus 380 is the solution, an affordable, flexible hardmat, built from a combination of fiber and hard plastics. It’s hard in design, warmer to the touch, and smooth enough for any mouse, yet if grit gets under it, it goes unnoticed. It looks classy, has endured the rigors of eight months of hard use without so much as a single problem, and I’m super-impressed. $25, www.mionix.net