Name: Sim Racing Wheel Buyer's Guide - 2020 Edition
Uploaded: 2020-07-18T19:00:06.265838+00:00
Duration: 1905 s
Channel: GTChannel

GTChannel

Thrustmaster T500 RS Steering Wheel & Pedal Set

Logitech G920/G29

Thrustmaster TX Racing Wheel

Thrustmaster TS-XW Racer

AccuForce Pro V2 Steering System

Read the Sim Racing Paddock 2020 Wheel Buyer's Guide: http://simracingpaddock.com/sim-hw/2020-sim-racing-wheel-buyers-guide/

Looking to get a new Sim Racing wheel in the near future? Then check out this wheel buyer's guide! I originally created a Buyer's Guide in 2017, with a minor revision in 2018, but now, it's time for a total revamp of the guide, featuring all the major wheels available for Sim Racers entering this new decade.

Unlike my Previous Wheel Buyer's Guide that focused SPECIFICALLY on the PC, I decided to make this guide an all-encapsulating guide, highlighting the wide variety of products available. Hopefully you can find what you're looking for in this guide!

Read the Sim Racing Paddock 2020 Wheel Buyer's Guide: <a href="http://simracingpaddock.com/sim-hw/2020-sim-racing-wheel-buyers-guide/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">http://simracingpaddock.com/sim-hw/2020-sim-racing-wheel-buyers…</a>Looking to get a new Sim Racing wheel in the near future? Then check out this wheel buyer's guide! I originally created a Buyer's Guide in 2017, with a minor revision in 2018, but now, it's time for a total revamp of the guide, featuring all the major wheels available for Sim Racers entering this new decade.Unlike my Previous Wheel Buyer's Guide that focused SPECIFICALLY on the PC, I decided to make this guide an all-encapsulating guide, highlighting the wide variety of products available. Hopefully you can find what you're looking for in this guide!

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There are 3 things to look for in a decent SIM racing wheel:

1. At least 900 degrees of rotation
2. Quick force feedback
3. Smooth driving feel

Honorable mention: more powerful force feedback in pretty awesome too...

What are the things to look for in a decent SIM racing wheel?

Gear Driven Force Feedback wheels are the oldest tech behind consumer grade Force Feedback wheels. It will use (commonly plastic) gears to create a transmission system to amplify the forces from the motor to the wheel. It’s a decent solution for budget racing wheels, but the two main drawbacks are noise and roughness. Gear driven wheels are easily the noisiest and least precise in terms of Force Feedback wheels, thanks to the way the cog system works. It’s a decent option for basic level wheels, but it is easily outclassed by the newer technology that is available.

What are Gear Driven Force Feedback wheels?

Belt Drive wheels are a relatively new tech, with the first consumer-grade Belt Driven models being sold around 2009 or so. Fanatec was the first company to release a consumer grade Belt Drive wheel, but then the technology was widely popularized when the Belt-Driven Thrustmaster T500RS was selected as the Official Wheel of Gran Turismo 5 in 2010. Since then, there has been somewhat of this “Belt Drive Wheel Arms Race” between Fanatec and Thrustmaster to optimize the technology, which has been great to see.

What are Belt Drive wheels?

A Direct Drive cuts the middle man out of the picture, directly mounting a steering wheel onto a large motor. And I mean “LARGE”. There is one direct drive wheel where the motor weighs over 14kg. The result of this? The strongest, fastest, and smoothest Force Feedback you can get or likely even want.

What is a Direct Drive wheel?

The first category that I’m going to be addressing is the Sub-100 Dollar bracket. And in that category… There isn’t exactly much. For the wheels in this price range, all that explanation about Force Feedback isn’t worth squat. If you are looking for a new wheel at the sub-$100 price bracket you won’t have Force Feedback, and you won’t have 900 degrees of rotation as well.

What falls under the sub-$100 steering wheels?

This is the area that I would call the “Sweet Spot” for getting into Sim Racing while still getting a full idea of what it is capable of. This is where you will start seeing wheels with the aforementioned 900 degrees of rotation and Force Feedback systems. In this price bracket, you will see the wheels utilizing geared Force Feedback.

What falls under the $150-$300 price bracket of steering wheels?

The $300 to $500 is the point where we start to abandon the Gear Drive Force Feedback wheels, and move up to the Belt Driven wheels. This is also where we start seeing more variety and more options available. Also a big draw from this price bracket is that we are going to start seeing wheels that feature interchangeable wheel rims, so that can add more variety to your experience.

What falls under the $300 to $500 price bracket of steering wheels?

This bracket is a very interesting one, as it is going to start getting into the higher end prosumer market, with some Direct Drive wheels entering this category. A couple years ago, when I created the 2018 edition of this guide, there were basically no Direct Drive wheels in this category, but now that we’re seeing the prices dropping below $1,000, that really is quite remarkable!

What falls under the $500-$1000 price bracket of steering wheels?

For the last category, we’re going from the $1,000 price point to, well, the top! We’ve seen some interesting models in the past couple years that create a decent amount of variety, including models from Fanatec and Simucube.

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