Sorry for the silly topic name. But I never really came across the idea of a deskmat until I started perousing mechanical keyboard stores, and I genuinely have some questions about how deskmats are used. Even though that probably makes me sound like I was born yesterday.
So I get that they look nice, and add some sound dampening to the keyboard, and feel nice to rest your arms on. Are there other benefits? In particular, are they good enough to use instead of mousepads? I recently bought a (relatively inexpensive but good quality) SteelSeries mousepad that provides a very smooth and low-friction surface for mousing. Will a deskmat feel like an adequate replacement, or will it probably feel like a downgrade and I'll want to place the mousepad on top? I've only seen "cloth" listed as the surface material for deskmats, if it's mentioned at all, which kind of makes it seem like this aspect isn't seen as particularly important.
Also, what about coffee? Can you happily place your drink on the deskmat, or do people find that the cup gets too wobbly/spills are too hard to clean/it ruins the feng shui?
Finally, does anyone know if cutting a section out of a deskmat would look ok, or would it likely cause bad fraying/bunching/peeling/etc.? All the deskmats I've seen for sale are 900mm x 400mm; my desk's shelving columns would get in the way of that so I'd need to slice some cutouts in the deskmat to accommodate them.
Thanks