RedOctane metal pad review

[alanj]

I was one of the ten chosen to go try out the new RedOctane metal pad. (Thanks, RedOctane!) I played six songs, and overall, I was impressed.

About me: I'm 28, 6'3", 200lb, out of shape, can do seven-foot songs, could do eight if I didn't double over wheezing in the middle. Have used crappy softpads (hated them), RedOctane's Ignition softpad (hated it somewhat less), and just got a CobaltFlux pad a couple of weeks ago (love it).

My impressions, with particular emphasis on comparison to the CobaltFlux since that's the main competition:

Performance: Outstanding. As good as the arcade, better than the arcade unless your arcade is really good about maintenance. Tough to compare to CF, the switches have a slightly different feel to them, probably closer to the arcade feel than CF. Neither pad was getting in my way, neither one had me wondering whether I missed that arrow or whether the pad was being cranky. (Keep in mind, I'm a seven-foot player - if one pad is better than the other for getting AAA on a cata, I wouldn't know it.)

I didn't notice the RO pad sliding on the thin carpet while I was playing, even on Witch Doctor (medium) with lots of jumping forward. But it had skittered forward a few inches after my first set of three, so it *was* sliding... just not very much. My CF pad doesn't slide at all at home, but it's also on a different carpet.

The RO pad has a couple of inches of non-button metal surface along the back, just so you don't fall off the back. It also might be easier to tell where the edges of the buttons are on the RO pad. In practice neither of these are a problem for me on the CF pad.

Appearance: Slick, very slick. Pretty. I do wonder how all that mirror-polished metal is going to hold up over time; it'd probably highlight the slightest dents, scratches, or bits of dirt or dust very nicely. :-/ My CF pad doesn't look quite as slick, but it's had two weeks of ambient dust and cat hair settling on it.

Control box: This is the biggest wart in the CF's design, IMHO. It's ridiculous that if you jiggle the cord slightly, the connector comes loose and the pad stops working. It's ridiculous that the manual has to include instructions for how to tape down the plug to keep this from happening. Unfortunately the RO isn't much better - jiggle the cord, the connector comes loose. The cord comes out from the pad and connects at the control box, unlike the CF where it comes out from the control box and connects at the stage. Good in that you're less likely to kick the control box than the stage; bad if it's not modular on both ends (is it?), because it's easier to replace the control box than the stage if something happens to the cord.

I understand that you can't screw down the connector for fear of causing damage, but couldn't it click into place and require more than a slight nudge to pull out? Sheesh.

Durability: I can't judge just from looking at it. It looks pretty sturdy, but the CF pad looks very, very sturdy. There seem to be more bits that could get bent out of shape than there are on the CF pad, and there seems to be some flex in places where I wouldn't expect there to be flex, but I'm a horrible judge of things like this, and someone with more of a clue about hardware should comment.

Noise: Quiet. Nothing clangs or creaks or clacks. Same with the CF pad.

Warranty: 60 days. CF warranty is 180 days.

Price: $199. CF is $299.

So. Which would I recommend?

At this point I'd have to go with the CobaltFlux, and it's all about the warranty and the track record of reliability. There's just no way I would spend $200 on a product that I'm going to be jumping up and down on without being really sure that it'll work for a lot longer than two months.

CobaltFlux guarantees their pad for six months, and reports from other owners suggest that it'll probably keep working for a lot longer than that. RedOctane says they're confident of their pad's durability, but for whatever reason, they're not guaranteeing it. And it's a new model so I can't get corroboration from anyone else.

If it weren't for the unknown reliability and the short warranty, it'd be easy to recommend the RedOctane metal pad. It's $100 cheaper than the CobaltFlux, and as far as I can tell, it performs just as well if not better. But that's a big if.

[WrathX]

[WrathX]

Oh, and I must mention, that if we hadn't have been able to come up with that fix for the cord connector, I would have been one very unhappy camper, because I would have had to call everyone and cancel But yes, I must stress, the control box issue is NOT a normal issue, someone stepped on it and broke it, so what you saw today is not what will need to happen if you purchase one.
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[nekura]

Will we ever see videos of the RedOctane metal pad in use? I've been satisified with my RO IgnitionPad 2.0 since I got it back in March; I learned how to play DDR on it, and am now doing Catas on it, and it's been holding up great. As such, I have a great deal of faith in RO's products, and might look into getting two of these pads instead of building my own, especially if there's an extended warranty.

A couple questions though...
1) Will there be a doubles bar, ala CF? If the pads do move around, even a little bit, this would be useful.
2) On the product description page, it says the pad has future compatibility for Xbox DDR. From what I can gather in the UltraMix thread, the game will identify whether you're using a dancepad or controller based on a standard USB string passed through the controller port. How will the RO MetalPad handle this?

Thanks for your time. =D
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ITG Freak

[DDRWannabe]

I would have posted sooner If I didn't live so far away from Sunnyvale. (I was the last person there)

So....I was one of the lucky ten who got to test the RO metal pad (even though I suck at DDR) Here goes my review......WEEEEE!!!!!!

Having never played on a Cobalt Flux pad I cannot compare so I'll compare it to the arcade. First off, It looks really good (shiny). I found it to be more responsive than any arcade machine I've ever played on. Whenever I steped on a button it responded imediately. Italso feels very solid and stable (it did slip a little on the crappy industrial carpet they had at the office). All in all the only thing that bohered me the slightest was that the brackets clicked a little but that was probably due to the many disassemblies.

-Will