The Razer Naga Hex ($79.99 direct) mouse has all of the things that we love about Razer's gaming products—solid construction, high quality sensors, smooth performance, adjustable and customizable profiles, and a look that screams cool. They can't all be winners, though, and unlike other Razer mice we've reviewed, the Naga Hex  makes a few frustrating design mistakes, sacrificing comfort for a flashy look.

Design
Weighing a mere 4.8 ounces and measuring 1.8 by 2.8 by 4.6 inches (HWD), the Razer Naga Hex borrows liberally from the design of other members of the Naga line, with the same sculpted shape and glowing accents on the scroll wheel, side buttons, and the Razer logo. Razer has dropped the matte finish used on the Razer Naga Molten ($79.99 list, 3.5 stars) and the special edition Star Wars: The Old Republic Gaming Mouse ($139.99 list, 4 stars) and replaced it with a glossy plastic shell. Admittedly, the shell is pretty cool looking, with a shimmering metallic 3D finish rippling through it. Unfortunately, the finish also gets slick under your palm when used for any extended period of time.

In addition to the usual right- and left-click functions, the Naga Hex has a clickable scroll wheel, and two buttons for forward and back movement through web pages. It also has six other buttons (more on those in a moment), for a total of 11 buttons plus a scroll wheel.

The defining feature of the Naga line of mice is the inclusion of several buttons on the left side of the mouse, immediately under the thumb. The buttons are mapped to the number row, letting you cycle through whatever weapons, spells or whatever other functions are accessed with number keys. Putting them on the mouse lets you click that much faster, making your gaming more efficient. In previous models from Razer, these buttons have numbered 1 to 12, and had a grid layout. The Naga Hex, however, changes it up with only six buttons, each one with a hexagon shape, arranged in a larger hexagonal ring—hence the name.

The hexagonal pattern of buttons on the side feels like it is placed too far back on the body of the mouse, requiring me to curl my thumb at an uncomfortable angle to use the buttons. The six mechanical buttons also feel far more sensitive than they do on the Naga Molten , enough so that I frequently pressed buttons when I only intended to grip the mouse. A rubber center nub does a little to alleviate this by giving your thumb somewhere to go, but again, the placement feels wrong.

The Naga Hex connects via USB 2.0, and has a 6-foot braided cable. That's long enough to plug into an out of the way PC tower while still giving you enough slack to move around, and the wired USB connection means that there's no interference or latency due to a wireless connection. It's similar to the SteelSeries Kinzu Optical Mouse ($40 street, 3 stars), a wired optical mouse with solid gaming performance, but with additional buttons.

Features and Performance
The Naga Hex has the same precision laser sensor seen on the Naga Molten and other Naga models, with up to 5,600 DPI sensitivity. Like all of the current crop of Razer gaming mice, the Naga Hex works with Razer Synapse 2.0, a customization dashboard that lets you configure your mouse, adjust the DPI sensitivity and acceleration, map buttons, save macros, and then download these settings to any computer that has Synapse installed. It's helpful both for the detail-oriented gamer who loves to tweak every setting, and for the gamer on the go, using the same mouse on multiple systems. Razer also covers the Naga Hex with a two-year warranty.

In actual gaming use, the Naga Hex proved a reliable weapon, tracking my every move flawlessly. The mechanical hex buttons served me well in both Team Fortress 2 and Star Trek Online, though they were still too sensitive, sometimes clicking unintentionally. The hexagonal 6-button layout is more intuitive than the 12-button grid found on the Naga Molten, but the issues with placement and sensitivity were hard to ignore.

The Razer Naga Hex does make an improvement or two over the other models in the Naga model line, primarily the hexagonal arrangement of the buttons and the reduction from 12 buttons to a much more manageable 6. Unfortunately, other design changes—like poor button placement, overly sensitive buttons, and a slick outer shell—add up to make the Naga Hex a bit of a disappointment. For the best multi-button experience you may instead want to opt for the Razer Naga Molten, or go with a more traditional gaming mouse with the Editors' Choice Gigabyte M8000Xtreme Mouse ($59.99 list, 4.5 stars).

COMPARISON TABLE
Compare the Razer Naga Hex with several other computer mice side by side.

More computer mouse reviews:
•   Logitech G305 Lightspeed Wireless Gaming Mouse
•   Razer Abyssus Essential
•   Cougar Surpassion
•   Razer Basilisk
•   Contour Unimouse
•  more