Razer hits the Xbox 360 with Onza controller and Chimaera headset, we go hands-on (video)
By Tim Stevens 
posted January 9th 2010 10:11PM
posted January 9th 2010 10:11PM
Razer's come from nowhere over the past few years to establish itself as a serious player in the PC gaming peripheral market. Now it's hitting the consoles, starting with the Xbox 360, and the first iteration of offerings are already looking solid. They were announced yesterday and we got some time with both, starting with the Onza contoller, described in detail in the video after the break. Each stick's resistance can be individually tweaked, there are additional shoulder buttons that can be assigned to replicate any other button on the controller (no more stick-clicking), and what's pledged to be a d-pad that's far superior to the generally junk one on the stock controller. Unfortunately they were still working on perfecting that, but everything else feels great already. The other thing on display is the Chimaera wireless headset, which uses a base-station to connect to the Xbox 360 (or other audio device) which doubles as a recharging station. Turn it on and it'll intercept the audio, silencing your entertainment center, and with a built-in microphone you won't have to stop the trash-talk. The Onza is set to cost $50 when it ships sometime by Q3, and the Chimaera for about $130 in the same period. We can't wait.
Don't bother with a 3rd party controller that doesn't have turbo. There are only two decent 3rd party turbo 360 controllers (a Hori and a Madcatz) and neither of them are in production anymore.
@mjemirzian The first-party controller doesn't have turbo and it's better than the ones you mentioned.
If it goes wireless, i would buy it for $65
i want to by an xbox controller for pc as it seems they are the most compatible with games these days. im glad i can buy this now instead of the microsoft one. i too would prefer the black. my problem though, why so long? q3? come on.
That is one sexy accent.
Sweet, now I can tea bag and not look like I'm having a seizure.
Maybe it's wired at the show, so that it stays working all the time, and doesn't need a recharge/battery-swap in the middle of a presentation. It might be wireless in real life.
@Rincewind it's not. It's wired.
put out a 360 and ps3 wireless versions and I would but them both, we banished wires in 2005, and I'm like a mile away from my TV (it's 60in) but seriously razer lose that wire and you have a sale.
From my previous experience of Razor products I wouldn't buy this. Bought a Lycosa keyboard, that as well as looking cheaply made out of low grade materials, came with several issues, I had heard about in reviews, but which I doubted a keyboard of it's purported calibre could suffer. Boy was I wrong, not only would the media control panel freeze-up but keys would also randomly stop responding, requiring constant disconnecting/reconnecting from the pc to sort. Coincidently I ended up going Microsoft in the form of the Sidewinder X6, a much better product and cheaper!
Getting rid of wires has been so nice... the first party controller works well, I doubt I would go for this and have to deal with cable tangle again. $49.99 is still more than than $38 you pay for an Xbox 360 wireless controller on Amazon.
I LOVE the idea of the third set of back buttons, but ideally I would would want to map things like jump and melee to them (which are on the ABXY buttons) AND THEN i would want to map the L3 and R3 functions to the ABXY buttons that I was replacing. Looks like you can't do it.
Takes them 9 months to release a simple gamepad, they should bury their heads in shame.
Q3?! I have to wait that long?! I'm hoping Q3 means "July 1st."
I can appreciate that pros need a wired controller with "less lag", but many of us would love a better wireless controller as well and have never noticed any lag in the standard wireless controller. I wish they'd put out a wireless one for the rest of us.