Build Quality

Overall build quality is solid. There is no rattle when shaking the mouse. When applying lateral pressure, no creaking or flexing of the shell can be observed. Activating the side buttons by squeezing the sides is possible but requires excessive force. Lastly, accidental clicks when slamming down the mouse do occur, albeit only if debounce time is set to 0 ms.

Buttons

Main buttons on the M5 are very good (left button) to decent (right button). Pre and post-travel are moderate on either button, resulting in a firm and snappy button response, but the right button on my sample appears at least partially broken, as when pressed towards the front, button response will be hollow and muted. Being visually separated from the shell, button movement is moderate when provoked. Button stiffness is medium. A pair of Kailh White Sword switches (white transparent shell, white plunger) are used.


Side buttons are very good. Both pre and post-travel are low to very low, and by virtue of being very small, the actuation point is even across their entirety. As a result of their size, feedback isn't particularly satisfying, though this is unavoidable. When gripping the mouse as intended, with one's fingers right at the front, the side buttons will be ideally placed, though actuating them by rolling one's thumb across may be difficult. A set of surface-mounted Kailh switches (yellow plunger) are used for these.

Two buttons at the bottom are used for cycling through the set CPI steps and given polling rates, both of which work fine. Two seemingly unbranded tactile switches are used for these. A slider at the bottom switches between 2.4 GHz wireless, Bluetooth, and off-state, which works fine.

Scroll Wheel

The scroll wheel is decent to good. Noise levels are substantial at all times, though tactility is quite good, as the steps are rather well-separated. The encoder comes from F-Switch (yellow, green core) and has a height of 9 mm. The middle (scroll wheel) click requires high force for actuation. An Omron switch (white plunger) is used for this one.

Surface

The M5 has a matte surface all over. Grip is fine, and it doesn't attract fingerprints or dirt too much. It is easy to clean, and there are barely any signs of wear left after doing so. All in all, very good materials.

Button Sound Test

Disassembly

Disassembling the M5 is easy. The screws are found beneath the front and rear skates. With these removed, two clips at the sides and front need to be dislodged, which is easily done. Afterward, top and bottom shell are readily separated.

The internal design isn't particularly efficient. The side buttons sit on their own PCB vertically slotted into a plastic assembly part of the bottom shell and connected through a ribbon cable. Everything else, including the battery, sits on the moderately thin main PCB, which appears unnecessarily large, and has been affixed to the bottom shell with three screws. For some reason, the MCU is rear-mounted, even though the top side of the main PCB would have provided sufficient space. Of note is that the scroll wheel LED is placed directly on the main PCB. The MCU is a Nordic nRF52840, whose datasheet can be found here. Production date for the main PCB is the 11th week of 2024.


As for the soldering and general quality of the PCB, I'm unable to find any noteworthy flaws.