Logitech G25 Racing Wheel by Logitech
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Our Price: $549.98 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $449.00 (click here) Category: CE See more digital camera details and other models |
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Digital camera reviews of Logitech G25 Racing Wheel
Digital camera Review: G25
Summary: 5 Stars
A successful purchase!! Everything received as promised: on time and on perfect conditions. Recomended to anyone.Digital camera Review: G25 : Not perfect, but still a very good bet
Summary: 4 Stars
I have been using Logi MOMO (the original red one) for the last 7 years, so I am immune to the "wow-factor" which seems to affect many people when they move to a nice wheel from a less than stellar one, or even a keyboard. Its a given that G25 is greatly superior to the vast hordes of me-too wheels out there, and comparison with using a keyboard is downright embarassing. So we wont even go there. Suffice to say that the G25 is among the better ways to spend your (or your dad's) well earned money.
No, this review is from the point of view of a person who has logged thousands of hours on a very high quality wheel, and then comparing the G25 experience with the previous one. So lets get on with it... :-)
Appearances : A good friend of mine once said... "i'm telling ya, the leather, and metal and paddles, is about perfect...". That applies to this wheel as well :D. Very sleek appearance, and a pleasure to behold.. the wheel and the shifter. The pedals, though, look a bit.. umm... un-elegant (bet hey, they're down there, out of sight..).
(Of course, my friend was talking about his own G25 when he made that comment, but it wouldnt be so funny if I had told you that right off the bat, now, would it..? .. ;-))
Installation :
Pros : Is a snap, and very intuitive. Everything connects in to the wheel. A smart little touch by Logitech, using different types of connectors for each cable, so you cant possibly plug a cable into a wrong socket. Attaching the wheel and shifter to the desk is also as easy as it gets.
Cons : 1. Now to the first thing I disliked about this wheel. Everything connects to the wheel. That means there are FOUR cables coming out of the wheel, and on to your desk. Thats 3 cables too many for me, adding to the clutter. Also, if you like to "stow away" your wheel after you've done your gaming, it could get cumbersome really soon. It is also not possible to remove any cables once your wheel has been attached to your desk, since the connectors are on the underside of the wheel. That has been a bit of an issue for me (not a showstopper though), but others may not be bothered by this at all. But at least, now you know.. fore-warned is fore-armed... :-)
2. Second con for me, the clamps on the wheel (to grip the desk) are a little on the smaller side. My desk curves a bit, so the clamps reach the edge of the tabletop with VERY LITTLE to spare. Its ok for me, but a little more curvature, and you can't use the clamp. Period.
Hardware (Wheel) :
Pros : 900 degrees of rotation, which is more than what you could conceivably need. Solidly constructed, and offers a good grip. A couple of little indentations just above the 3 and 9 o'clock help ensure your hands dont slide off during the heat of the moment. The wheel mounted butterfly-pedals are brushed stainless steel, sturdy, and offer a satisfying click. I read somewhere that Logitech is moving away from the "click", but this is clicky enough for me..:-). Another nice little touch here.. the pedals are "tall" enough that you are not limited to the 3&9 o'clock driving positions to be able to access these pedals. I use the 3&9 grip for my racing, so no advantage for me but for those who don't, rejoice.. :).
Cons : 1. Only two buttons on the wheel. Sure there are MANY more on the shifter-unit, but when you're in the middle of an intense section, the last thing you want to do is to take your hand off the wheel (AND eyes off the screen) to locate and press a button on the shifter. Im my opinion, a wheel should at least have 4 buttons.
2. Also, the two buttons are not positioned very well. They are exactly at 9 and 3 O'clock. So whats the problem with that? If you GRIP the wheel at 9 and 3, then the NATURAL position of your thumb would be closer to 10 and 2. To get to these buttons, you either have to change your grip on the fly, or bend your thumbs in an unnatural position. You could probably get used to it in a while, but if your coming off off a wheel with perfectly placed buttons, then it takes a bit of an adjustment.
Hardware (pedals) :
Pros : Fully functional clutch. And that too one with full "travel". 0 to 100, you may call it, as opposed to 0/1 ON/OFF button style clutch you'd get to see in some models. The stiffness of the three pedals (clutch, brake, gas) is respectably close to real life. Not the flimsy stuff (specially brakes) you find in other sets. Nice touches, but the feature I was most impressed with was the little retractable spike-belt at the bottom on the pedal set. This grips (and I mean GRIPS) on to your carpet, keeping the pedal set stationary under moments of heavy braking. This is a brilliant idea, I'm surprised it hasn't been implemented before. So simple, yet so effective. No more putting blocks behind the pedal set for me and bracing these blocks against the wall to keep the pedals from running away from me.. :-) (ahh.. the things we pseudo-racers do to get our kicks.. lol)
Cons : 1. The inclusion of clutch means that we are little cramped for space down there. The brakes and gas pedals are a little too close, and you can often get your ankles (and heels) tapping each other if you do left-foot braking. For right-foot braking folks, this is a gift from heavens, I suppose... but I prefer some space between my gas and brake pedals.
2. For all its stiffness, the resistance in the brake pedal is still not progressive. This makes it difficult to tell, just by your feet, how much braking you have done (and of course, more lock-ups). Of course, in all my years of sim-racing I have yet to come across a set which does that, but in other sets you could replace the brake spring with something more suitable (squash ball, tennis ball, dead squirrel ;)) to get that progressive resistance feeling. If you dont know what the he11 I am talking about, try it out (not the dead squirrel though, they tend to shrivel up after a while, not to mention the stench.. lol, but if you can get a fresh one ever day, go for it... ;-D). I assure you, progressive resistance on a brake pedal makes a HUGE difference to the consistency of your braking. In G25 however, that modification is not possible, since the brakes are in the form of a piston assembly.
**[EDIT (Nov 19, 2007) : I have since found out that such a mod is indeed possible, it's just a little more involved]
3. No swivel-tops at the top of the pedal. Some people abhorr them, some love them. I am in the second category. The swivel top ensures that no matter what angle your feet hit the pedal, it feels natural (because the top swivels to align itself with your feet). Fixed top pedals offer a very limited range from which your feet can "hit" the pedal comfortably. And as you press down on the pedal, that angle changes, and you have to adjust your feet to accomodate that change (If you dont know what a swivel top pedal is, check out the pedals on the red Logitech MOMO force racing wheel. Its no longer sold but at least is listed out here on Amazon so you can check it out)
Hardware (shifter) :
For all the noises I make about my experience in sim-racing, my experience with shifters amounts to ZILCH... :P. I've always preferred the wheel-mounted paddles for my gearshifts, and dont see that preference changing anytime soon. What'd Jim Morisson say about driving?... oh yeah.. keep your eyes on the road and your hands upon the wheel... ;-). For what its worth, the shifter looks nice, and competent. I'm just not the right guy to review it. Even if I use the shifter with G25, I have no previous experience to evaluate it against.
Driving experience :
The first thing I noticed with this wheel was how weird some tracks look when you end up facing the wrong way... ;-D. The feel of G25 is noticably different from my MOMO. Not worse, not better, just different. I noticed that I was over-steering (hence spinning) a lot more with this wheel than I was with my older one (I know what you're thinking... 900 degrees of rotation, but thats not it. You can actually set how many degrees you want, and I set it to 270, which is what my old wheel had.. to make the transition smoother). To compensate for that, I had to use a lot more throttle in mid-corner compared to the old one. Thats not necessarily a bad thing. As long as I can control the car and get it going where I want, I dont care if I am using only the wheel, or wheel+throttle+brakes. I personally prefer the wheel+throttle+brakes, thats why I love my old Momo so much since it was so good at that.
The force feedback is pretty strong, about the same as red MOMO which I thought was too strong (hey, I am a small guy.. lol). Fortunately (as with the Momo), the FF can be fine-tuned to your liking, and with these tunings, the FF felt very nice. Precise enough to let you know what the car was doing, but subtle enough not to tear your arms away.. :-). Just like the red MOMO, and that's a compliment.
Overall experience was positive, even though I have had more spins in the last 2 days than I did in the last 2 yrs (the darn "getting used to" process..:P). With a little more time, I think I could get used to this wheel and be competitive again. Currently I'm about .5-.7 seconds slower with G25 than I was with the Momo, on an average track. And thats a good sign. I didnt expect to be that close to my Momo timing so soon with a new wheel. This could mean one of two things, a) this wheel is extremely good (which is a good thing), or b) the G25 handles more like the red MOMO than what I currently think (which is also a good thing).
Now, if I can only get used to the lack of progressive resistance in the brakes... :-). If there is one thing that could make me regret giving up my Momo, THAT would be it.
**[EDIT (Nov 19, 2007) : I have since found out that a mod for this is possible, it's just a little more involved than what I did for Momo. There's goes my major complaint.. :-)]
Digital camera Review: G25 Wheel
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a great product, realistic feel responds much like the real thing. Only issue so far is we use it on the PS3 and only three games so far work with it. I am sure that will change. So far none of the games support the gear shifts, you use the flippers on the side of the wheel. This is easier on the F1 game because it is so fast you hardly have time to get to the gear shift. I highly recommend this product for those who like racing on the PS3 for the price.Digital camera Review: G25 racing wheel review
Summary: 3 Stars
I paid $18 for shipping on Amazon and never got my product after 9 days. Somebody lost it. It shipped again, and I didn't get credit for the high shipping fee. G25 is nice and works, but even though it's advertised to work with Vista, the CD software was for XP. I had to go to the internet (not in instructions) to find Vista Version. (Since this is only a game PC it wasn't connected to the internet, so I had to download to hard drive, make a CD and transfer the software to the Vista machine.) This is a $300 wheel, and Vista has been out for a long time!
Then it ships with a free trial racing game that has the Logitech lable on CD and G25 pre-set software. Only the pre-set software doesn't work, and a call to Tech support can't help. Unable to play racing game sent with Logitech G25 wheel. I'm not a happy customer.
MaxPI
Digital camera Review: G25 wheel - awesome pedals, nice handling, some defects
Summary: 4 Stars
June 2009 - Ok I need to preface this now that I have had it for a while - this wheel was wonderful when I first got it, but it didn't last the way I had hoped. Particularly the paddle shifters - they definitely have been a pain to deal with over the hundreds of hours I've put into this rig. Persistent double and triple shifting due to the flimsy metal which tends to 'flutter' if you tap it the wrong way (often when you don't mean to such as during aggressive maneuvers or quick corrections).
I finally got frustrated enough to try hooking up my old DFP wheel and I realized what I was missing - although it took some adjustment, the wheel weight feels much better, inspires more confidence (and the paddles never double-shift by accident). Mind you I have now been to Formula racing school so I have some frame of reference, and I finally bought a real car as well which is set up more for performance than comfort. The G25's resistance feels like a rubber band compared to the Driving Force Pro - the G25 is smoother for quick changes of direction, but when you get over 200mph in a twitchy car you sometimes feel a little disconnected from the responsiveness. I don't remember exactly what about the force feedback architecture was different between the two - something about a single versus double spindle? anyway you'll find that the double has some strange side-effects at its limits (really high speeds and/or bumpy roads), while the single of the DFP is better able to be consistent under the same situations.
The real dilemma is that the plastic pedals on the DFP are annoyingly light compared to the wonderful metal pedals on the G25. I thought, maybe if I used the metal pedals with the DFP wheel I'd have the best of both, but unfortunately they are not compatible. (I even tried using the plastic pedals on the G25 wheel to see if they'd work, but that actually makes the brake pedal work backwards.)
Anyway, what I most realize about my old review is how much I needed to work on my footwork at that point in my skill progression, more so than working on steering inputs; and the new G25 equipment really met this need:
February 2007 - I actually got this item at the same time as I purchased the Sparco racing cockpit (with a Siena seat), for playing Gran Turismo 4 primarily (although it also works great for NFS Most Wanted or F1 Championship on the PS3). The good news is this wheel is a huge improvement over the Driving Force Pro, and it seems Logitech has paid attention to the reviews in designing the G25. The overall physics of the feel and feedback is more accurate and lifelike, the action is much quieter than the zipper noise we used to endure, and now the wheel will actually straighten on its own like a real car does. I find that this is most helpful during rally or any kind of drift driving that is steering-happy, but even the twitchy Formula car is easier to handle. I also think that this wheel is more of the correct size, even for Formula 1 enthusiasts. The paddle shifters are of course easier to use than the little buttons. I hardly need to say how much better it is to have leather and steel instead of plastic and rubber. And the pedals, even though the clutch is not yet supported by many games, are far better in terms of the weight of the brake pedal and the board overall.
Now for the bad news - within a week I started experiencing intermittent double-shifting from the right paddle (any gear, could be 1st to 3rd or 5th to 7th) which is really annoying even if you catch it quickly with your left paddle. I read that some WD40 could fix this, so I applied some and it seemed to help. Also, the new shifter mount hangs down quite a bit and is wider than the pro cockpit can currently accommodate (I have it mounted to the side so I can still use the other buttons which are no longer on the wheel itself). Finally, I don't really think the position of the brake and accelerator are quite right for heel-toe, despite what the product description claims.
Nevertheless, if you can get this wheel it will make driving games feel much more realistic (which makes them easier somehow, and more enjoyable). Within a few weeks I had little trouble clearing all the GT4 license tests with gold times. I'm sure the added accuracy of this equipment would help anyone improve their game.