INTRODUCTION

   RGB lighting may have been around for just over 7 years in the PC industry but in fact it's been used in the electronics industry for over 12 years now and more specifically when the first LED Philips Ambilight TV's made their rather historical debut back in 2007 (Ambilight TV's had been around since 2004 but due to limitations from their cold-cathode fluorescent lamps these didn't feature RGB lighting). The Cyborg amBX Gaming Lights by Mad Catz was the very first gaming peripheral to try and imitate the Ambilight "effect" for PC users and even though back then it was indeed quite impressive it failed to become the best-seller Mad Catz was hoping for. Today even though the market is filled with RGB LED strips of all sizes none of them is really designed for PC users and this is where CORSAIR comes in with their brand new iCUE LS100 Smart Lighting Strip which we've been using for almost 2 weeks now.

   Founded in 1994, CORSAIR has grown from pioneering the high-performance DRAM market into one of the world’s leading providers of high-performance PC peripherals and components. CORSAIR offers a complete range of products to equip gamers, enthusiasts and e-sports athletes, including mechanical keyboards, precision gaming mice, wireless headsets, high-performance components that gamers use to build gaming PCs, and the CORSAIR ONE fully-integrated gaming PC. With a company-wide commitment to quality, innovative design, advanced features and high performance, CORSAIR products have won thousands of media and industry awards, earning their place in gamers’ hands and PCs following years of development and engineering by a team dedicated to building great products they themselves would want to use.

   The iCUE LS100 family of smart lighting strips includes the starter kit which should be more than enough for single monitor use (contains two 450mm and two 250mm LED strips along with a two-channel external RGB controller) and two expansion kits for people with dual-screen configurations (the first contains two 450mm strips while the second contains two 250mm strips). According to CORSAIR the strips of the iCUE LS100 are made out of flexible light-diffusing material which softens and blends light for the most immersive effect and as for the number of available RGB LEDs in each the 450mm long strip features a total of 27 individually addressable ones while the smaller 250mm long strip features a total of 15 (84 LEDs in total for the starter kit / up to 192 LEDs supported by the RGB controller - all LEDs are fully adjustable via CORSAIR's iCUE software). So, let's move forward with today’s review and see if the iCUE LS100 is the RGB LED strip kit(s) to get for your PC.

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

CORSAIR send us all three members of the iCUE LS100 family and all three have the same product picture at the front (only the size of the box changes).

Same deal for the rear since here we see the features and specifications of the LS100 in 10 different languages.

Interior packaging also changes since the starter kit also comes with the RGB controller.

Inside the iCUE LS100 starter kit box you will find two 450mm and two 250mm long strips, two-channel RGB controller, strip extension cables, USB cable, power adapter, 16 small metal plates, 8 cable management clips, warranty guide and the user manual. On the other hand, each of the expansion kits contains the two LED strips along with two expansion cables, small metal plates (9 for the 450mm kit and 7 for the 250mm kit), two cable management clips, warranty guide and the user manuals.

THE ICUE LS100

The rear of all strips is made out of flexible rubber and all have the CORSAIR logo on them.

Now even though the 450mm strips have 6 and the 250mm strips have 5 plastic bases only the center 4 on the former and 3 on the latter are actually magnets.

The front of the strips is made out of flexible white diffuser silicone.

I was glad to see the small (65x38x15mm) two-channel RGB controller not only features a soft rubber coating but also has an on/off button at the top.

At the front we see the two 3-pin channels whereas at the rear we find the micro USB and power ports.

Two magnets are also placed at the base of the controller which again connects to two metal pieces with adhesive tape on one side.

These metal plates are just 1.59mm in thickness so they don't add almost anything to the depth of the strips.

The 1.5 meter long USB cable is braided and has regular plugs on both ends (not gold plated).

INSTALLATION

For this review we'll be using our office/lab AOC AGON AG352UCG screen (even though it already has 4 LEDs at the rear those are not dynamic RGB ones).

The very first thing that becomes evident when mounting the strips is that the magnets are not nearly powerful as they should be.

Because of that the 450mm strips don't stay in place, especially on a curved screen like this one.

Luckily the situation with the 250mm strips is better since they are mounted vertically.

Mounting the entire kit took less than 5 minutes.

Since the RGB controller is also mounted using magnets it's also not very stable.

With the strips and controller mounted and the screen back on the desk everything's good to go (and yes as you can all see the strips can be turned on even if your computer is not - also please excuse the lack of cable management).

ICUE SOFTWARE

As always in order to use this CORSAIR product you will need to download the iCUE software from their website.

Once you install and launch the software it will detect the LS100 starter kit and list it on the top right.

Clicking on that picture will take you to the main tab which just has a picture of the RGB controller.

From the lighting setup tab, you can configure each of the two channels according to the use you want.

You can choose one of the 24 available effects or make your very own from within the lighting channel tab.

At the bottom of the software screen there's a hardware lighting selection from where you can choose which effect you'd like assigned for when your computer is not on or if the iCUE software is not running.

As usual the drop down menu the iCUE software allows the end user to monitor the status of the system, use instant colors, perform firmware updates, adjust the brightness levels (this should probably be in the lighting tab instead) and access various secondary settings.

In the above pictures you can see some of the available effects (do take into account that we forgot to disable the rear red LEDs from the AOC screen so red stands out slightly more in some).

The strong selling point of the iCUE LS100 strips is that they can sync with games, movies and even music players and as you can see from the above pictures that's accurate.

CONCLUSION

   When i reviewed the amBX lights by Mad Catz almost 8 years ago i was very impressed and so even though it took very long for me to find something better the iCUE LS100 is exactly that. The brightness of the LEDs is very good (would be nice if these were CAPELLIX ones however), the silicone material is very flexible (alas somewhat bulky compared to regular LED strips), the ability to expand the kit is most welcome and the level of customization offered by the iCUE software is unprecedented for such devices. Still the iCUE LS100 is not quite perfect and aside the problem with the rather "weak" magnets (good thing these are removable so CORSAIR can always make available even stronger ones) we all feel that the starter kit is not really suitable for all screen sizes. For example, as you can all tell from our pictures the end result is not quite what one would expect with our 35 inch ultra-wide screen (good thing we didn’t use the 40 inch model). I did try to solve that issue by expanding the starter kit to also include the 250mm expansion kit onto the same channel but even though the first channel can be used with up to 138 LEDs i just wasn't able to (will keep trying however and update my findings if something changes).

   The iCUE LS100 line was released less than one week ago and currently the starter kit retails for USD119.99 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and for 102Euros inside the EU (Amazon.co.uk) a price tag which is a tad higher than what we’d consider suitable. As for the 450mm/250mm expansion kits these are not widely available yet but CORSAIR does list them for USD39.99/29.99. Overall even though the latest iCUE LS100 is a bit rough around the edges it’s by far the best smart lighting kit available for PC users currently and certainly deserving of our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality
- 84 Individually Addressed RGB LEDs (Starter Kit)
- RGB Lighting Syncs with Games, Movies & Music Players
- Available Expansion Kits (Dual 450/250mm)
- Two Channel RGB Controller with On/Off Button
- iCUE Software (Customization)

CONS

- Price (For Some)
- Magnet Strength
- Not Ideal for All Screen Sizes (LED Intensity / Starter Kit)