Ozone TRACE Extra Large Sized Professional Gaming Mousepad Review

Ozone have supplied thier brand new TRACE Gaming Mousepad for review. Lets see how this new companies product fares…

Product on Review: TRACE Extra Large Sized Professional Gaming Mousepad
Manufacturer: Ozone Gaming Gear
Street Price: Around £17

Today we see the arrival of our first Ozone gaming accessory – the Ozone TRACE Extra Large Sized Professional Gaming Mousepad.

Alongside the usual well respected and widely known companies it’s often difficult for newcomers to appear. They can make their mark through creative thinking and innovative design.

Ozone are one of these companies and whilst they are indeed very new they are making their presence known in the professional gaming circuit.

Here’s a little from Ozone themselves:

OZONE Gaming Gear, is a European brand of gaming peripherals that revolves around the concept “It’s all about Evolution”. OZONE is a brand created by and for gamers, the evolution is part of our gaming life, we all want to improve and evolve into a better gaming contender. OZONE is committed to the development, engineering and evolution of innovative gaming peripherals with an unique style and the best performance, to allow gamers to exceed their limits and become the best. It’s all about evolution.

OZONE provides customers a wide range of gaming peripherals. Everyone from the occasional user to the professional gamer is ensured to find a OZONE product at a reasonable price which will fit their requirements to enjoy their favourite games. OZONE Gaming Gear, “It’s all about Evolution”!!

Looks like they have a clear and definite idea of what they want to offer – let ‘s take a look at the TRACE to see if it offers the performance you’d expect.

Specifications

These are the specifications provided by the Ozone website. A large multilayered mousepad with peace of mind offered by that extended warranty.

Here’s what Ozone have to say about the TRACE:

Ozone TRACE has some remarkable features, it has been designed with an extra large surface (400 x 280 x 4 mm) to fit any gamer’s expectations, because with TRACE you won’t have space limitations.

This mousepad becomes the perfect option for designers or intensive users, because TRACE has an advanced layered design to offer the highest comfort for extended periods of use. Its layered design has been engineered with 4 different materials, which combined form a great multipurpose mousepad. The first layer is a rubber base that stabilizes your moves, and fix the mousepad to any surface. The second layer is a high quality hard plastic piece to give TRACE the exact weight and stability. The third layer has an air-filled matrix structure made of polyurethane, specially designed to offer softness when you rest your wrists on the mousepad. Finally, the top layer made of heat treated micro textured cloth, which offers the smoothest feel and the softest flow.

Ozone TRACE, apart from being a great choice when choosing a mousepad, also has a strong attitude, expressed by its unique gaming design, printed over the thermally treated cloth surface.

Ozone TRACE. Extra large sized, extra large gaming.

Packaging and pad

The TRACE comes in attractive packaging with a portion of the pad itself protruding beyond the cardboard outer. This allows the prospective purchaser to have a good look at the pad itself. It’s typical Ozone branded colour too… red, black and white.

The front simply mimics the printed design found on the mousepad’s textile surface.

Packaging.

The rear highlights the quad layered design along with some additional specification information.

Packaging rear.

Out of its packaging the pad can be seen in all its glory. The design harks somewhat towards the excitement of FPS gaming with a gritty handgun wielding character and a helicopter in the background. I’m sure the design will sit well with the people that choose to buy it. Also of note is the curved base of the pad. All other sides are perfectly straight suggesting the curve has a function of some kind… possibly ergonomic.

Pad front.

The base of the pad is a rubberised and knobbly design that should grip most surfaces very well indeed.

Pad rear.

Closer look

Looking closer the TRACE is branded with the Ozone Gaming Gear logo – a tidy and subtle design. I much prefer this to the ‘splash massive logo across whole pad’ approach!

The Ozone logo.

Here you can clearly see the four layer design that Ozone have used in producing the TRACE mousepad. The red vein is the rigid plastic layer with the soft foam layer just below – this gives the TRACE its ‘semi rigid’ property.

The layers of the TRACE.

Lastly I must mention the shirt that Ozone kindly bundled with the samples they sent.

Front.

Not sure if these will end up available on their site but I like the design. Love the ‘Evolution’ theme in particular!

Back.

Testing

I tested the TRACE alongside a Boogiebug soft mousepad and used a Razer Deathadder, Razer Diamondback, Microsoft Laser Mouse 8000 and Ozone’s own Radon 5k professional gaming laser mouse (which is up for review next!).

The TRACE with the ‘soon to be reviewed’ Radon 5k!

That’s a combination of two optical and two laser mice. Despite the useful comparison of different weighted and sized mice on a surface the use of different tracking systems is particularly important as optical mice can be somewhat finicky when it comes to different tracking surfaces.

Performance

I can confirm that the TRACE performed excellently allowing each mouse to track accurately and reliably. The semi rigid design means you get a very predictable surface whilst also retaining the comfort of a soft textile mousepad.

The rubber base meant that the pad didn’t slip once during use and its size meant the need to lift the mouse back for another sweep wasn’t needed as often.

Compared to the Boogibug pad I used next to it the TRACE offered a slightly more dependable experience probably due to the increase in accuracy afforded by the firmer surface. Also, despite the acreage offered by the Boogiebug, the smaller (but still large by mousepad standards) TRACE was perfectly useable during both desktop office work – indeed, that soft foam layer made document work and windows tasks comfortable and fatigue free.

Now onto what the TRACE was born to do – game wise I tend to play first person shooters on my PC more than anything (it’s what they’re designed for really!!!) and the TRACE coped well throughout. It was accurate and comfortable even during longer gaming sessions. Very impressed!

Conclusion

Hopefully this is a sign of good things to come from Ozone. The TRACE is an excellent gaming mousepad.

Yes it\’s price places it firmly alongside other top gaming peripheral companies like Steelseries and Razer, but if they are going to produce products like this then I for one back them.

The TRACE Gaming Mousepad.

It\’s a competent first outing for Ozone – the design theory seems sound and the reality of the product simply can\’t be ignored. In conclusion, the TRACE offers a very decent alternative to the usual Gaming mousepads out there. It\’s well designed, fairly priced (in my opinion) and looks good too – all these factors have helped it attain Gold status here at Vortez.

Pros
+ Nice design
+ Good looking
+ Comfortable in use and accurate

Cons
– Nothing at all from what I can see