ASUS has created many unique, groundbreaking products before, and the ROG Balteus Qi is definitely one. A portrait-oriented mouse pad with USB pass-through, Qi charging, and controllable RGB lighting is not something you see often.

One thing that makes this a very unique mouse pad is the surface itself. I've never seen a hard pad with such a texture—it is rather coarse and control-oriented, resulting in quite a lot of friction. Some people might like this, but honestly, a main reasons people buy hard pads is for pure speed, which isn't the Balteus' strong suit. On the other hand, if you prefer a slower, more controllable glide, it can be an optimal choice, of course.

As for tracking capabilities, the surface is pretty good, but some low-end (or older) sensors might not like it as much (I could not detect any real anomalies besides some spikes with the MouseTester software). Build quality is very much a strong suit of this mouse mat as there were no issues at all I could find. Everything is nice and tight, and I couldn't find any bumps or uneven areas, or any sort of fraying on the cable sleeves.

The underside is straight up fantastic on this pad. ASUS did a terrific job with both looks (which isn't very important as you won't be seeing it anyways) and, more importantly, actual adhesion to the table. It takes great force to move it around once it's set to a position, so it won't accidentally be sliding around below your hands.

I have never used a mouse pad with a built-in Qi charger before, and in my opinion, it won't be cause for much of a hype (even though some manufacturers have already done so). If you don't find it disturbing to place your Qi-chargable device on a medium-sized mousing surface, thus taking a lot of space from the mouse to move freely, the Balteus Qi can be an ideal choice for you because of the Qi charger. If ASUS releases a mouse in the near future that can be charged wirelessly this way, I'm sold on the idea.

RGB lighting is one of the main marketing points of this pad, which means it just has to be good, and it definitely is good. With 15 zones, a myriad of different, great-looking effects, and the option to synchronize through Aura Sync, it definitely stands out of the crowd. The lighting is nice and bright, the colors are vivid, and the transitions are buttery smooth. You can change the lighting properties with the button at the end of the panel, or through ASUS ROG Armoury. It's an intuitive, well-designed, fast, and bug-free program that is rather heavyweight when it comes to disk space, but doesn't consume a lot of memory in the background.

The ASUS ROG Balteus Qi is a very expensive mouse pad at $110. However, if you don't mind losing the ability of wireless charging, the standard, non-Qi version Balteus might still be appealing, and it is considerably cheaper. I would gladly recommend the Balteus to anyone who finds its specifications suitable as I found it to be a nearly flawless product with many great features.