I’ve wanted to be a Razer fan.
I’m an old 51. Bear with me. Back in 2007 I was so happy with my Belkin N52TE Speedpad (the great granddaddy of the Razer Tartarus Pro). In 2009 or so, I picked up the Naga with its amazing 12 side buttons. Next Razer product was a Cynosa, and I was going good for a while. In 2020, life drastically changed, and while I wasn’t doing great financially, I saved up and bought a Naga Pro (gifting my previous Naga to my nephew), and a Blackwidow v3 Pro to go wireless. Around this time, my beloved N52TE died, and I replaced it with a Tartarus Pro. I’ve also bought a Barracuda X, Firefly mousepad, and a Seiren Mini (and I bought one for my nephew as well).
I have never been able to keep my Blackwidow and Naga Pro working correctly. I simply want 3 things:
1) To work (not freeze/stop)
2) To be Wireless (that’s why I paid more for the wireless versions)
3) To allow custom lighting.
I can get 2 of those things to happen, but never 3. I believe beyond a doubt it is because of the Synapse software. I have tried every “fix” I’ve been able to find on the internet over the last 5 years - many multiple reports across various forums and sites seem to go back 6-7 years to this same issue. I’ve used different USB connections (hubs non-powered, powered, direct to Motherboard 3.0). I’ve linked the keyboard and mouse to the same dongle and separated them. I’ve uninstalled and reinstalled Synapse a hundred times. I’ve reformatted my SSD and reinstalled Windows. At some point (a month, a week, a day) the mouse and keyboard will disconnect and stop working. The keyboard/mouse separately stop, not at the same time. I have to flick the switch to turn them off then on again to get them to work. As time progresses, the length between freezes/stops shortens until it’s happening within minutes of turning off/on. I’ll search online try multiple “fixes” and if I’m lucky the cycle starts over until it happens again in a month/week/day. Sadly, each “fix” lengthened my patience, and I liked the idea of all my hardware matching the custom lights. The warranties are long over and while I didn’t directly reach out to Razer Support, there are enough posts on this problem and enough Support answers, that I’ve seen and done them all. All “fixes” are temporary.
What I’ve found:
- If the keyboard/mouse stay connected via wire, then they will always work, and I can get the custom lighting through Synapse. But then they aren’t wireless.
- If they are wireless, they can get the custom lighting through Synapse but at some point stop working until turned off/on.
- If quit Synapse completely, or uninstall it, they will work wireless and never freeze, but because they can’t save the custom lighting to the hardware, they do the singular color cycle lighting that I hate.
I’ve tried RGB programs and get the custom lighting, but then without Synapse, they can’t be programmed, and I haven’t found a 3rd party app to program them. This has been going on for 5 years. Each Synapse update, each firmware update, I’ve been hopeful, but the cycle continues.
I finally got financially stable and last month I bought a new computer (9950X3D/5090 RTX - replacing my i-7 9000/2070 RTX Super). I saw Synapse 4 and installed it onto the new computer. It took me a week to get it to detect all my hardware and apply the custom lighting. It would always not work with either the mouse or keyboard. I’m not sure what I did, but after several Synapse 3 and 4 uninstalls/installs I finally got Synapse 4 to detect all the Razer hardware and apply the custom lighting through Chroma. Even though my motherboard and an external HD say they can sync with Chroma, they don’t.
This week the keyboard and mouse both started the freeze cycle to the point it was 3-4 times each hour. It broke this camel’s back. Synapse 4 is no different than Synapse 3 with this issue. And not working with the motherboard and HDD, I don’t see a point continuing with Razer. The whole grand “vision” Razer sells to us is to sync everything up with one program (well now 2 with Chroma off-shooting from Synapse, but requiring them both to run), and for me personally for my keyboard and mouse to be wireless. But it simply cannot happen. Hundreds of dollars on hardware I want to love, but not having custom lighting without using Synapse and 5 years of this issue being known and reported only for it to continue with Synapse’s newest version broke me. I had a nice experience with a wired Redragon mouse some years ago. I used it with my laptop and as a backup mouse and felt it was equal to my original Naga. Now they have wireless keyboards and mice with custom lighting, and I ordered a pair and will try them. It’s a worthwhile chance for 1/5 the price. As my other Razer gear ages out and breaks or as I find another brand I like that can harmonize, I’ll replace them with non-Razer products as I’m already on the “Fool me twice, shame on me” part of the saying.
