The typical gaming-grade mouse found on shelves can be dauting to those less inclined to face several buttons, a thousand configuration options and all the bells and whistles that are now market standards. Going against the flow, Zowie released a mouse with only three fixed tiers of resolution, just two extra buttons and no weight adjustment system or any configuration software. That is, it's a simple alternative to models that look like an airplane control panel. Was it a good bet from Zowie. Let's get to that after describing the physical characteristics of the peripheral.

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Figure 1: Zowie EC1

The EC1 is a right-handed mouse with a shiny body of plastic with a rubberized cover on the palm rest. There are only two non-configurable buttons above the thumb rest. The scroll wheel isn't white but translucent – it changes color to indicate the current DPI setting (red for 500 DPI, purple for 1000 and blue for 2000). The cable is made of plastic, not cloth-wrapped like most gaming-grade mice.

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Figure 2: Scroll wheel and thumb buttons.

The EC1 features only two enormous Teflon feet underneath as opposed to rival models that usually have four smaller ones. The resolution selection button is located besides the optical sensor.

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Figure 3: Underside

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Figure 4: Illuminated scroll wheel