Logitech USB PlayStation 3 Driving Force GT Racing Wheel

This review is for those that are looking into getting their first wheel or don't know much about racing wheels, and to clarify some questions I see many people had with the wheel. This review is with the PS3 only. First off, from my score, obviously I liked the wheel. Like most have said on here, it's of great construction. The wheel is of plastic and is heavy and solid; the pedals are plastic too, but is of the highest quality plastic you can get. The wheel has a rubber grip on it, which makes it comfortable and avoids slippage. The GT symbol in the black button in the middle of the wheel lights up very subtly, so it doesn't distract while playing but looks good. Some have said the shifter feels cheapish, but it's actually the same hard plastic, and is of nice quality. Racing on this instead of the controller does take getting used to. At first I was skeptical and thought my track times and performance had actually decreased, but after a day of play I found you get comfortable with it and driving becomes second nature without much thinking involved (like driving a real vehicle). The wheel is great fun, and it really responds well to turning and such (you can tweak the wheel in most approved games). For those getting a wheel for the first time and some clarification on features: What is the force feedback? When does it work and what is it for? Force feedback only works with a very few select games. In fact, from my collection, I have found it only works with Gran Turismo: Prologue. What the force feedback is: when you are driving your virtual car, the wheel actually has a strong motor inside that turns and jiggles the wheel in reflection to the game world. Say your car is on a steep graded curve. The wheel will want to turn you towards the top of the curve because thats the way the physics pull the car, so as others have mentioned you have to 'fight' with the wheel. Prologue has settings for how hard the wheel turns you, so you can set it to your liking. This is what ultimately makes the wheel worth it, and makes driving become second nature with the wheel. The compatibility is something that needs to be brought up and clarified. The wheel will work with some racing games that let you pick your control settings, or sometimes it will be set right from the start. However, if you are planning to buy this wheel to play with all your car driving games (For example: Gran Theft Auto 4, Motorstorm, Wipeout HD, and others) then you might want to reconsider. From what I have found, this wheel will only reach it's potential in GT:Prologue and GT5 (when it arrives). Even if it works with the game, there is no force feedback and the wheel either is very tightly locked by the motor and hard to turn (GTA4) or is left to turn loosely without any motor feedback, making driving awkward and difficult. Also, none of the extra games I tried use the pedals either. You have to push the 'X' button or 'R1' button in the middle of the wheel while driving, which is nearly impossible while steering. Now, if your are getting this for GT: Prologue, GT5, or other compatible racers: What is the red colored dial, and what are the plus and minus buttons near the bottom of the wheel? These are actually only used in GT: Prologue and probably GT5 later on. They are used during a race, and are the only way to tune your car in the game. You press the button in the middle of the red dial and a quick menu pops up. You navigate up and down through the menu with the Plus and Minus buttons, and then turn the dial to change the setting. You can change ABS, TCS, Braking for rear and front tires, and more. Remember, this only works in Gran Turismo! No other games have this feature (that I have found) or make use of these buttons! Some have given different impressions on mounting the wheel. You can adjust the clamps quite a bit, and they come with a section that is removable to give you even more space on thick tables. Some have said you need a heavy object like a wood table to mount to, but thats not completely true. I used a TV tray, with crossing metal legs and hard plastic surface, about 24 inches off the ground. Yes the table moves a very little bit, but it's not a big deal at all. Actually, a little bit of movement makes driving easier for me. My only complaint is if I sit back on the couch I tent to push on the wheel and that slowly slides my stand forward on the carpet. Otherwise TV trays and lighter tables work too. However, for the ultimate experience, get one of the 'wheel stands' which are probably sold here on amazon (they are expensive, more than the wheel). Almost everyone will make do with tables and stands though. The wheel auto calibrates it self (which scared me the first time!) when you start a game or turn on your system by rotating all the one to one side, then back to the other, and finally rotating till the wheel is centered. It's a nice feature that makes sure your wheel is centered every time. The last thing I wanted to touch on was the shifter. Although it only has a movement of up and down (which I was disappointed in at first) I grew to like it that way. When you are racing, you want as little distraction as possible, and with this small click up and down, it takes the hassle out of shifting. The pull on the switch is very short, about a half an inch before you shift. This is nice and makes shifting quick rather than wrestling with a slot machine handle type deal. One last thing actually: In contradiction to others, I purchased this wheel in September 2009 and mine did NOT come with GT: Prologue so don't count on that. -------- All in all the wheel is of great quality, and works great with Gran Turismo (And games that specifically support racing wheels). However, if you want this to race on other games, or not working well on other games is a deal breaker for you, look elsewhere. Thats the largest issue with this wheel by far. In it's defense however, it is the 'Official wheel of Gran Turismo', so that says something about the product... It's great for the money, much cheaper than the G25, and in this case you do NOT get what you pay for, you get something much much better!

To put it simply, I cannot go back to joysticks for driving games. I've been playing racing games for around 10 years now, starting with GT3, using the ps controllers and always wanted a wheel. Once I had the financial means to justify a wheel purchase, I pounced on the $50 off price this week and went for the GT Force. I was considering a used G25 or a G27 but i didn't want to overspend on my first wheel so i went for a sub-$100 wheel. Therefore, my review will be useful for other first-time-wheel-buyers (for GT5) rather than the more experienced. Hardware: The wheel itself feels very sturdy made with a combination of solid plastic and rubber (on the wheels). There are buttons that allows for in-race adjustments such as ABS, traction control, etc (if vehicle is equipped with such options) and they are also of high-quality plastic. However, it is very difficult to adjust the settings on the fly unless there are long straights on the track. It comes with a +/- shifter on the right but i rarely use it since I prefer the Paddle Shifters located on the back of the wheel at the 3 & 9 o'clock position, which is attached to the wheels so they will follow the turning of the wheels. I actually prefer the paddles that follow the wheel rather than it being stationary because I hold the wheels at the 3 & 9 position so I always have the Paddles on stand-by, especially after coming out of a sharp turn. There are buttons for the horn and wipers as well. Overall, the quality is very satisfying for a sub-$100 wheel. The accelerator/brake pedals have a bit of resistance to them but not THAT much. I've seen some mods done to adjust the pedal's resistance but haven't tried them yet. Actually, I don't really mind the default resistance and I'll probably just leave them as is. There are spikes underneath to limit movement on carpet. However, the angle of the pedals aren't what I'm used to on a normal car and a subtle adjustment to the height of the pedal based may be needed. Integration with software: I have only used this is tandem with GT5 and the integration is seemless since it was originally designed for the GT series (GT4, to be specific). There are options within GT5 to customize the functions of each buttons on the GT Force if you're not satisfied with the default settings. There are also settings for the subtlety of the force feedback and power steering, if needed. Driving Experience: Again, now that I've experienced the driving wheel, I'm hooked. I bought the PS3 specifically to play GT5 but it's been collecting dust after a month of playing mostly because I felt I wasn't "connected" to the game. Now, your whole body will feel the fury of the tight turns and high-speeds as you'll struggle to keep the car in line without fighting with the force feedback. It really gives your shoulders a workout especially if you keep them tensed up throughout a race. That's something I didn't know I needed while racing with the ps controller. There's nothing wrong with using ps controllers but its just that I feel like you aren't maximizing the GT5 experience without a wheel. The ability to feel the uneven pavement, the subtle adjustments needed on dirt/snow tracks, the force feedback on turns, on-the-fly car setting changes, a working horn button (yes, it's a very important addition imo, haha). Some of us will never go out on a real track with track-ready cars but the GT Force + GT5 setup may be all you need without endangering your life. Or it also could be a first step to becoming a weekend-racer. Conclusion: So yea, I'm never going back to joystick racing again. If anything, the GT Force will be my "gateway-accessory" to more precise wheels in the future, maybe even the Thrustmaster T500 but it could also mean building a dedicated racing cockpit in the garage. Hope this review helped those who are iffy about investing on a wheel for the first time.

This is a excellent product with the current software playstation makes. At first I was worried with the slight lag in the wheel until I hooked it up to the ac adapter and configured it with Grand Turismo 5. Then with the wheel turned off there was no lag. Now I'm not saying in the game in a high end sports car at high speeds there is no lag. Yes there is a big lag at high speeds. Think about it, If there was no lag at high speeds you would roll your car which the software couldn't show in graphics. The design of this software doesn't show roll overs, just crashing to the side of the tract. I'm not a software programmer only all the games I've played or at least Grand Turismo 5 doesn't show roll overs. It's just the nature of the beast until ps3 games can support software with roll overs this is the best you can get in a car simulator wheel. Maybe ps4 Car Club will support car roll overs. Only until it comes out we will never know for sure. Until now this is the best you can get in a fairly low cost wheel. There might be other ps3 games that support car roll overs only I'm not sure. Right now as I write this review this is the best for the price you can get. I'm happy with it after I cleared up the lag problem. Now I know better. I just checked the wheel after this re-review and it had a slight lag with it unpluged to the ac adapter. Yesterday it didn't today it does. I still like this wheel and I'm sure it will re- calibrate when I restart Grand Turismo 5 or plug in the ac adapter again. It's not a perfect wheel only look at the reviews on You Tube and see that most people like it. I hear very little negative about it. That said get it if you're in the market for such a wheel. I just played a ps3 game called need for speed hot pursuit, a 2010 game only still relevant to this day, and this game had no lag even at high speeds only in a low end police car. I don't know how it will respond to a high end car. Probably like Grand Turismo 5 maybe. This is a game where you can chase speeders that have high end cars. The police sometimes race in high end police cars too if you can go to high enough levels or try to avade the police as a speeder. It's a cool game so far and I recommend it with this wheel and gas pedals and brakes. The wheel and pedals are extremely responsive with this game. This wheel is now as far as I'm concerned well worth the money even at the home store Amazon price.

Games I Tried: The Logitech Driving Force GT is one of the best steering wheels you can buy and the price is crazy awesome for such great quality. The games I have tried it out on are: Gran Turismo HD, Burnout Paradise, GRID, and Need for Speed Shift. Everything ive tried except nfs shift worked AWESOMELY. In GRID you can feel the tiny bumps in the road and feel the gears change just like real, and the game recognizes the wheel and actually has customization settings in the pause menu to let you make the wheel more comfortable, grid is definately a game to get for the wheel. In Burnout Paradise you get overwhelmed with speed and power and its just so crazy awesome with the wheel. Gran Turismo HD doesnt have all the capabilities and isnt as good as gran turismo 5 prolouge only because the wheel was actually made for gt5p, but gthd is still pretty realistic.Yet the one game thats been a disapointment SO FAR has been NFS Shift ,,its a great game but it seems like your car wants to swerve around by itself with the wheel, so I suggest renting the game if you dont already have it if you're planning on playing the game with the wheel. Cons: There are some bad things that I didnt like. The fine tune adjustment dial ONLY works for GT5 prolouge. The PS button ONLY works (so far that I know) for GT5 and NFS Shift ( go figure ). The stick shift barely gos up and down, just a little click,but I got used to it. It was a bit tough to find something to attach the wheel to considering my coffey table was quite good enough, but i figured it out pretty good. And the big thing is the cords, you got a cord going from the pedals to the wheel, a cord connecting the wheel to the PS3 so its not wireless if you thought it was, and A CORD GOING FROM THE WHEEL TO THE WALL!!! the only purpose of the power cable is for the force feedback for some reason, so if you dont care for the force feedback then you wont need the power cable. Cool Stuff: First when you plug everything in the wheel starts to turn by itself calibrating, and I was just Super-Excited at that point. In Burnout especially, when you jump a hill the wheel gets really lose and when you land it jerks over just like it really would. The GT symbol in the middle is actually lights up. In Grid especially, you can feel the bumps in the road and feel the gears change. The wheel turns 1.25 times both ways like it says and it actually works right. LOOKS CLASSY BUT POWERFUL! Pedals have a retractable grip on the bottom. Has Pad shifters on the back of the wheel if you dont like to use the regular shifter. The GT symbol is also supposed to be a horn, but I haven't found any games capable of it. I HIGHLY SUGGEST GETTING THIS WHEEL OVER THE REST!!! Unless you want to shell out an extra $200 for a six-speed shifter and a clutch, you should save money considering i bought mine for $60 not including shipping and saved around $250. I have even heard a couple people say that they got a copy of GT5 prolouge for free, but i didnt,,,i wasnt expecting it though..........BUY THE WHEEL!!!NOW!!!

First off, I know my way around a car, know and understand driving and racing dynamics, and am a car enthusiast above all. I understand concepts of trail-braking, lift-off oversteer, etc. etc. So I'm not your average casual driving enthusiast. Unfortunately, my level of tast in cars and racing does not meet my budget - (currently in college). So this is the best I could come up with for the money. I paid $100 with free shipping for this wheel. It seems to fluctuate like the DOW. With the new Thrustmaster wheel for GT5 costing around $600, this is a bargain. Fanatec offers their GT2RS - which is compatible with the XBOX, for $100 less. And I can tell you simply, the Fanatec looks better - and is German designed. The Logitech G27 is somewhere inbetween, going for about $300, (again, price goes all around the place). Read other reviews for complaints about wires or the packaging. I didn't really care. I ripped the box open and set it up within minutes - no problem. The wheel feels fine. The only complaint is the recessions in the back of the wheel for the screws, which I can feel. The shifter buttons behind the wheel are NOT paddles. They do require some pull, more than any road car out there- so it takes some getting used to. I currently use the sequential shifter on the right for handbrake (pulling towards you) and reverse (pushing away). The wheel itself drives fine. The belts are loud. This wheel is setup for a full 900 degrees of rotation, just like your average road car. Most race cars have much much smaller steering racks, that don't allow that many turns. It takes some getting used to, but you really have to "saw" on the wheel to get the car to dance. Pedals feel great. There is a difference between gas and brake. The adjustment dial is fantastic. I use it several times in a race, for adjusting brake bias for long straights (think Monza), traction control, stability, or adjusting power bias on AWD cars. The fact that this wheel was designed for GT5 helps quite a bit. I do wish the 900 degrees could be adjusted - so my race cars in the game could have a real race steering rack, instead of a road car's. The biggest complaint I have is the mounting. If you have some majestic mounting device to put this wheel on, good for you. Like most of us, TV trays are the closest thing. And they DO NOT work. Try drifting, just once. And the whole wheel will move the table. Even a 20-30lb coffee table can get yanked when you are doing serious driving, even with the force feedback set to (default) 5. I haven't had the balls to try level '10.' I am going to build my own setup out of PVC pipe and then make it rigid. A 24 hour race is in the works with a few pro-drivers, and we will be doing 24hrs of straight driving - so we need something rigid and in the correct position - (without shelling out the $350/400 for a PlaySeat). The reason why it gets 3 stars? It simply isn't a real car. An actual car experience gets 5 stars. I haven't found that yet. Part of it could be due to the game (Gran Turismo is still FAR from a real simulator). If realistic mounting options from the manufacturer were available this wheel would get 4 stars. But telling us to mount it to a coffee table is unrealistic. Where do the pedals go? Any real racing setup for this wheel requires an overly expensive racing seat like the PlaySeat. And if I'm going to spend $350 on a seat - I'm going to give it the best wheel I can, which in my mind would be the Fanatec. For the money ($100 shipped), this is a great buy. It gives the non-racer a great experience - and anyone with any sense of driving can apply real driving dynamics to this wheel and get the feedback and results like you would in a real car. *Can't wait to play DIRT with this wheel. Haven't yet, but will update review when I do*

as far as the steering wheel goes, it's pretty awesome. makes any racing game a blast to play and more enjoyable and rewarding. all the buttons feels good, and mechanically it works well (the force feedback makes some noise, and rumbles if you crash. but if you've played at an arcade, it happens there too). a main concern is finding a set up to play on: table, chair, and tv position. putting the wheel on a folding table won't really cut it, as the table will tip side to side when your taking turns. you'll need to find a table that is weighted well at the base, and has a wide width to be rigid to take lateral forces. If you have some sense of car physics (which you might seeing your buying this steering wheel), you might understand this idea of low center of gravity, wide track, and rigidity of the car makes for good handling. same applies to the table. there are many tutorials on building a stand for the wheel. these make good sense because you can design it according to the seat you'll be playing in, because once you find a good table to set it up on, you better hope the seat your playing it gives you a comfortable height relative the the steering wheel and the tv. my set up right now is a c-table, i placed the pedals on the base so i can use the force from my feet to weigh it down (i plan to add weight to it still). it still sways left and right, but i think its more about the rigidity of the table, which i plan to find solutions to, but it also sways because of it's narrow width. it's also pretty tall in respect to the tallest chair i own, the steering wheel is almost at eye level. thankfully my t.v. is set up pretty high on top of my drawers, or this would have been another problem. The product itself is great. for the price your paying it makes any racing game a lot more fun, controls are top notch. the only problem is finding a setup adequate to create a comfortable driving position. this takes a large effect to how enjoyable this wheel is, and the price point if you consider paying for a set up.

I am using this steering wheel for Gran Turismo 4, Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, and GTR: Evolution (and other simbin sims). You get the following items in the box: the steering wheel itself, the pedals, and the power supply. The steering wheel feels very good in your hands, and the overall build quality is very good. The only thing I do not like on the steering wheel is the sequential gear lever that's to the right of it. There seem to be some contact issues which make it very hard to do sequential down-shifts (i.e. you're coming up to a corner, full brakes, you need to go down from 5th gear to 2nd gear). This is very disappointing when you are driving a DTM/WTCC touring car which use these types of gear levers in real life. However, the paddle shifters are excellent, and are extremely fun to use. I love the Manettino dials on the wheel. In GT5, they allow you to tweak the car's handling during the race (brake balance, traction control, ASM, torque distribution, etc), and in GTR: Evolution I set them to control the pit stop menu and brake distribution. The pedals on the other hand feel very cheap (probably because they are), and I really wish Logitech made them out of metal instead of plastic (but then that's why there is the G27). The force feedback is superb. The gears are a little loud, but you won't be able to hear them when you are actually racing. Once you play a racing game with a feedback steering wheel, you cannot go back to anything else. The feeling you get when you're blasting down the Mulsanne straight in a Le Mans racer while feeling every bump through the steering wheel is unbelievable. Completely worth the price of admission. Please note that if you are going to use this for your PC, make sure you download the drivers from Logitech's website to enable all the features.

BACKGROUND I've always been skeptical about buying a wheel for racing games. 100 bones to put down for a video game accessory is a bit much, right? Then I looked at my library of racing games for my PC, PS3, and Xbox 360, and I got to thinking how much more playable these games just might be with a wheel. After all, what fun is controlling a stock car or indy car on your computer with a Joystick or Keyboard anyway? And why is it that I can't seem to seamlessly go through turns and straightaways on my controller for my PS3 or Xbox 360? So I read the millions of reviews for this thing along with several other wheels out there on the market, and decided to plop the money down for this thing. WHAT I USE THE WHEEL WITH I play Grid and Formula 1 extensively on the PS3, and for PC it's the NASCAR series from EA and TOCA Racing 3. This wheel works phenomenally with these games. However, the wheel is only is as good as the game it's on. With that said some games you can't adjust the sensitivity and the force feedback like you can on other games. You can't tweek the wheel in some master hardware setting on the PS3. Everything is done in game. On the PC it's different. There is software that comes with the wheel to where you can set everything how'd you like it universally with every game. I've been treated just fine so far with the games I play for PC with this wheel. WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THE WHEEL Where do I begin? This wheel is amazing. Really. I've been shaving lap times left and right on all my games. In one case I can actually just play the damn thing (Formula 1). I couldn't play the game at all with a standard controller without running into somebody or just completely spinning out. In fact, I contemplated selling it outright just because how frustrating it was to play. Now I can actually enjoy racing in that game, and be competitive against the AI for a change with this wheel. The ability to shift in two different spots is awesome. There are paddles located behind the wheel, or you can use the shifter to the side. The force feedback can get wicked crazy, and for me I've had to dumb it down on all my games just because of how powerful it is. The pedals are nice, and have a rough bottom edge so that they won't slide around on the carpet either. The wheel itself is a pretty good size; as it's just a couple inches short in circumference in comparison to my real wheel for my '08 Honda Civic. On the subject of the wheel, the grip of the wheel is solid as well. Sensitivity is nuts, and the ability to turn the wheel a couple times over is great, too. However, if you do have to turn the wheel that much, it's probably because you've spun out and you should just restart the race anyway. Overall, the wheel just feels well made despite the lot of plastic on this thing. Nothing feels like it could come apart if I were to jerk the wheel a certain way. I've had this thing for about a month now, and between myself and wife beating the heck out of this thing it still works like a champ. Oh, and my wife hates sim racing games ... until now. She loves the wheel, and I'm so happy that she can enjoy a racing game that doesn't involve Mario for once. I also love that I can use this wheel on both my PS3 and my PC without problems. MINOR STUFF I DON'T LIKE ABOUT THE WHEEL When I first tried to play the game Grid with this wheel it was unplayable. I came real close to giving up and going back to my controller. I read online to try and find fixes for this, and the results were mixed. Some said they gave up and said this wheel is not meant for Grid. Others said you have to take your time and tweak the heck out of it to get it to work. Well, I stayed patient. After a week of off and on tweaking, I managed to not only make the wheel playable, but I was beating my old times I incurred using a controller. But that's what I don't like: if I pay 100 bucks for something it should work right out of the box and it didn't. I had to mess with this thing for days before I could actually start to enjoy it. However, my persistence did pay off and now I have to play this thing at least once every other day. However, to set thing thing up is a pain. There are 3 cables: one for the pedals, one for the USB connection, and one for the power to the wheel. It takes some creativity to get the cables to go places without causing a tripping hazard for those not playing, and so that your cables aren't intervening upon your pedals, either. Plus, you have to find a table of some kind to hook the wheel up to. My wife and I don't have a coffee table, but we do have TV trays. So my wheel has to connect to a TV tray with me on the couch, and that is not a comfortable situation without some creative pillow placement. Don't even try using this thing on your lap ... just don't even think about it ... it won't work. Now using this at my Computer Desk is a different story. It sits perfectly there, and it takes up minimal room where the only thing I have to move out of the way is the obvious object that needs to be moved anyway: my keyboard. Oh, and then the obvious no-brainer MINOR reason not to like the wheel; it won't run on a 360, but you can blame Microsoft for that one. The Xbox 360 only runs with proprietary hardware made by/for the Xbox 360. So if you think you can play Forza with this wheel ... well you're out of luck. OVERALL Overall, this really has been a fantastic purchase. I never thought blowing a hundred dollars on something so trivial as a thing like this could escalate the amount of joy I get in racing games, but it sure did. However, you really have to be a fan of racing games to enjoy this thing, and you must be patient, because unless you plan on only playing Gran Turismo games with this thing, you're going to be spending an exorbitant amount of time tweaking this thing until you feel it's right. However, the experience you get in return is amazing. I don't know if it's realistic or not, because I don't race cars in real life. However, I do know that I think this thing is ridiculously fun to use with my racing games, and I do know that it's made playing them about 500% easier! Plus it runs on your PC, too!