LogitechG27 USB Racing Wheel for PC

I had originally used the Thrustmaster Ferrari GT Experience 3-1 wheel for games like Need for Speed (various titles under this) and then iRacing.com. After purchasing iRacing.com's product, I found that such a wheel was not up to the standards of the simulated race experience. So, I saved up and purchased the Logitech G27 Racing Wheel. Let me tell you this, the difference is AMAZING! There are tons of great things I can say about this, but I will spare you that for now and get straight to what you will want to know - the cons.Logitech does not con you with this product, but there are a few pitfalls. Straight away, you will have to 4 chords to manage. They could have put it all into 2, but they gave us 4. But once you work out a system, or get one of those nice wire management foam/plastic shells you're good. The other pitfall is that you might want to work out your arms and shoulders some before getting this! It only can put out a max of 3NM of torque, but trust me those 3NM of torque will tire you out quick if you're not used to such harsh reality. In real life driving wheels can be subject up to and beyond 10NM of torque! (that's more than enough to break fingers and possibly arms, if not injure you!), but you're safe with this product from any injury as long as you keep ergonomics in mind. Also, at first, with such torque at the wheel you will want to make sure to take frequent breaks. You won't believe how fast this wheel (when set to realistic specs of 102% overall effect in the window's control interface, and the default of 16FFB in iRacing.com's settings if you're getting it for that) can tire you out!*****BUT*****Here's the great things about this product from logitech!This wheel is the closest you're going to get to the real thing for under 300 bucks! Amazon provides a great discount here.Once this is set up, you can set it and forget it (for a while, EVERY wheel needs recalibration here and there, even the best).It's the most solid build you'll find. It's even quieter with helical cut gears!You get 3! YES 3! Pedals. Clutch!, break and throttle. Does it get better than this in simulated racing? I mean it's pedals are covered in REAL STEEL! The wheel's frame seems to be steel too! The pedals' base even comes with 3 ways to keep it from moving, hard mounting (screwing into place on say something like a Playseat, can I advertise for them enough?), rubber feet for hardwood floors, and even spikes at the back than can be pulled down to keep it from moving AT ALL on carpet! (And such great design there! It won't move, nor damage your carpet/rug!) Can I say enough about these pedals? I think not!It's accessability is rated 4 just for the amount of chords and the time you'll have to take to set it up in windows and in your various games/sims (which shouldn't take THAT long ;) ).It's comfort is second to none! It's genuine leather they wrapped it in! (though, it has a lot of torque, you get used to it once it's set to you're preference and you give it time)Speed of this wheel is incredible... it can't be turned faster than real life would allow, unless you turn down/off the forced feedback (FFB). With FFB turned off, it's like driving a Cadillac, or so I've heard.You can't get much more real, nor can you get much of a better feel than this... real steering wheels are bigger, but you don't need it really.It's immersion is second only to the real thing.Ergonomics... GREAT!, IF AND ONLY IF you keep in mind where you are supposed to keep your hands and take frequent breaks! Otherwise you could injure yourself. This is professional level simulation here. But if you keep correct positions and breaks in mind, this wheel will not injure you. It's like anything else out there.Cable management could have been better, but they do give you some stuff to help out with the 4 chords they give you. 4 groves to places them in so they don't get pinched and before that a place to wrap excess cable around.Overall, this is the best product you can get for your money (unless that elusive G29 ever comes out, ROFLMAO). There are more expensive products out there, but you will pay much more for them! You can spend hundreds of thousands of dollars for a real simulator, tens of thousands on the lesser equivalent that doesn't move but will give you feedback in the pants in the form of knocks and vibrations and good sound/visuals, 500 USD or more for over-the-top reproductions of this wheel, or you can get the original! The logitech G27 Racing Wheel for the pc is THE BEST wheel you will ever get, without paying too much. Some would say 250 USD is too much, but trust me. You get everything you pay for, and THEN SOME!**Oh, and one last thing, make sure if you're doing your sim racing on a desk (as opposed to the Playseat also available on Amazon), that the desk isn't a cheapie! This thing will have your desk and everything on it bouncing (and possibly breaking), including that expensive HD monitor you payed a lot more for ;). (But don't worry too much here, I haven't bolted anything down and have yet to have anything break or fall) Otherwise I'd recommend bolting down everything that's loose, or at the very least duct-taping it all down! I'm being serious here, that wheel has a ton of force in it. When Logitech call it "force feedback" they mean it has FORCE! 3NM of torque, that is a TON of force for a gaming/siming race wheel!**

This is a good quality wheel. Overall I would definitely give it five out of five stars. But it is not perfect and there are some idiosyncratic aspects that I have encountered.I bought this wheel to play GT5, and Midnight Club LA and similar car simulation, driving and racing games on the PS3. It works for PC too but I haven't tried that yet.Quirky things I have noticed:*Whenever I first power up the PS3 the G27 does a full calibration by turning all the way to the right and then all the way to the left and then turning back to the right until it centers... but when I start a game (for example GT5) it does the calibration again... but this time it doesn't center... it ends up slightly slanted or crooked. Also, maybe its just my wheel but when the GT5 starts and it first starts to turn to the right to do the calibration thing it "shutters/stutters"... the rpm lights and the turning motion momentarily freezes and "shutters/stutters" during calibration, but only when it is turning to the right... and this only happens as GT5 loads, it doesn't happen during the initial calibration when PS3 first powers on....*The G27 claims to have a "push down" reversible gear. But I could never get the G27 to reverse with the gears. Also the whole thing can not be "pushed down"... so I don't understand what they mean by a "push down" reverse-able gear... you can NOT push the snifter down at all! There is no way to reverse the car using the shifter/gear because it won't even have the grooves to let you put it in reverse! The diagram on the shifter is not how it actually is... I can put the gear in 1, 2, 3, 4, and yes even 5... but the reverse does not work! It seems to be a fake position that doesn't even exists on the G27*It took me a while to figure out that G27 has to be put as controller #1 in order for it to be recognized and work in games like Midnight Club LA. On the Logitech website they list both the GT5 and Midnight Club LA as fully compatible with the G27 out of the box. This is not entirely true. It is not actually plug and play. At first I thought I got a bad/dud G27 until I had to Google for tech support online and came across forums that said you must put the G27 as controller 1 because it will be recognized in the game... but the thing is if G27 is in controller 1 spot, the ps3 controller itself no longers works in the game, even when I put it on controller 2.... what ends up happening is the ps3 controller becomes useless inside the game itself, meaning I have to use the buttons on the shifter/gear in order to navigate the menus and such in the game... This is annoying and a MAJOR hassle.*For the Midnight Club LA the G27 wheel is WAY too sensitive and over-corrects too too too much. This makes it almost impossible to accurately and enjoyably play. In GT5 there is option to adjust sensitivity of G27, but in Midnight Club LA you are SOL... Of course on the PC you have the drivers and software and can do what you want with the wheel, but for PS3 it is locked down and especially for games and titles like Midnight Club LA the G27 sensitivity makes it useless and it can't be adjusted.*The "real leather" on the wheel feels fake. I'm not saying it is not real leather... it just subjectively feel like synthetic leather... this is not exactly the kind of leather you find in a Lexus or anything...*There are too many wires with this setup... it is a mess and easily you can trip over yourself or worse someone trips it over and damages your G27... it makes it worse that the wires are so short... if you have a large TV and want to sit back a bit from the TV you run the chance of accidentally pulling the wires out.... not good...*You really need to get a playseat or similar item for this G27 .. that will end up costing you more than the G27 itself. The attachment devices that comes with the wheel and gear is cheap quality plastic and cannot secure anything at all... I tried to secure it to my table/stand only to have the whole wheel free fall to the carpeted ground 4 feet below... cause the darn plastic attachor thing came unhooked and loose... the wheel is very heavy, so even a free fall of 4 feet could permanently damage it... I'm not sure if mine sustained mechanical damage or not... I ordered playseat with this device but the device came sooner than the seat... so I had tried to mount it to a table but really it doesn't work well at all....* There is no way to turn off the force feedback in GT5 for the G27. In the options I know it seems like you can turn it off... but in actual races when you hit something or run into rough ground the force feedback comes into full swing.... it is annoying, and it is powerful force feedback that makes you lose control.... especially when you are already drifting and trying to countersteer, the force feedback will make matters worse and cause you to lose concentration and then crash you on purpose.... In GT5 there is NO way to turn force feedback off! This means if you drive on the dirt road it will be impossible to maintain control, might as well use a ps3 controller...