What do you get when you take the G15 gaming keyboard, slice it in half, pump it full of steroids, and let it loose to the gaming masses? You get the G13 that's what! Logitech’s first foray into the palm sized speed pad market is definitely something they’ve been working on for a while. The G13 was first released at the end of 2008 and since then, the upgraded profiles and third party game support for the G13 gamepad has been expanded. Continuing with our PC Gaming Peripheral coverage, GamerWok cuts through the fat and gives you the facts on this top of the line gamepad for serious PC gamers.

The first thing you will notice with the G13 is the included LCD. It’s not a simple readout LCD but a full sized, 3 line, LCD. This LCD is essentially a smaller version of the G15’s readout and the same drivers actually drives both screens. Built in support for the most popular games of the day are included with the drivers but many application developers have released lots of plugins for games not natively supported.  The LCD is also controllable via hard buttons along the bottom and to top it off, you can customize the LCD's text display color.  Let me make this clear, not just a "selection" of available colors, but a fully customizable color wheel!  That's the sort of "bling" you're paying for when you pimp your PC with a G13.

This is not a small pad and you need the space on your desk for it to be effective. I think it’s safe to say that the G13 is by far the largest gamepad available today. The G13 is tailored to be a jack of all trades and could conceivably replace your keyboard for your MMO, FPS, and RTS needs.  Even though it can cover a lot of genre's of games, it's not really meant for use with something like Plants VS. Zombies.  That would be like buying a Porche for driving to the end of your driveway!  The G13 is slightly lighter than the Nostromo N52 (1.54 lbs) at 1.48 lbs.  Even so, it's girth will keep the pad stable and stationary during even the most aggressive of play sessions.

One of the most common complaints from users of these pads is the length of these pads.  Traditionally, you use these pads with your palm firmly in place on the desk or its rest, thereby making it difficult to reach the top row of buttons or the ones that are situated furthest away from the user's fingers.  Unfortunately, the G13 doesn't quite solve that problem completely but it does alleviate the issue somewhat.  The pad is designed with a slight curve around the center row of keys but even with that, you're still having to reach for the furthest row of keys.  The good news is that if you've got larger hands, you shouldn't have an issue.

Playing around with the macro software allows users to specify exactly what each key will do and at what time.  The setpoint software is robust enough to even allow users to specify a time duration in between key presses to an accuracy of three decimal places!  The addition of onboard memory means all your macro settings can travel with you machine to machine, perfect for the LAN party crawler and multiple machine users.

As far as gamepads go, you can't beat the G13's features and looks.  It's beautifully designed, made with quality parts, and the features are amongst the best you'll find in gamepads today.  Logitech's first entry into the PC gamepads is a definite winner.  For anyone looking at such a device, the G13 will be the one to scrimp, save, and scrounge under your couch for that extra spare change because this is the creme of the crop.  But it's a good thing to remember that a G13 isn't necessary nor is it made for every gamer.  The price is slightly prohibitive but if you can afford the fine Italian sports car, why settle for anything else?