Customer Reviews

Microsoft Wireless Optical Desktop for Bluetooth

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(19)

 

 

1. It is NOT bluetooth compatible. It will stop functioning if there are other bluetooth transceivers around that are not the included Microsoft one.
2. The transceiver does not function with Bluetooth PDAs or phones, it only supports a small percentage of bluetooth products.
3. The keyboard and mouse will ONLY work with the included Microsoft transceiver (there -are- rare exceptions).
4. The included "convenient" adapter for laptops causes the Bluetooth dongle to poke +4" out of the USB port.
5. Many people are having their keyboard stop working suddenly after days, weeks, or occasionally months. There are workarounds, but they only sometimes work.
6. The keyboard and mouse are slow to respond.
7. There is no off switch on the mouse, so if you transport it remove the batteries.
8. The battery life is atrocious.
9. Sometimes a key on the keyboard becomes stuck down (not physically) and the letter pours across your screen. The only fix is to click elsewhere until it passes. Sometimes it is particularly ugly, such as when backspace is what is stuck.
10. The aforementioned has now occurred twice since beginning this review.
11. It is a very nice-looking setup.

I put my heart before my head on this one. It's the nicest looking mouse and keyboard you can put on your desk, plus it's got a bluetooth transceiver, what more could you want?

How about a product that works? For whatever reason the mouse and keyboard go to sleep after only 2 or 3 minutes of inactivity which would be fine if they didn't take literally 2 or 3 seconds to wake up. It is very annoying and causes problems when trying to use a (sleeping) keyboard modifier on a non-sleeping mouse.

Then the mouse eats batteries.

The bluetooth transceiver they include basically doesn't work with anything else. Certainly not any of the Pocket PC's out there.

No indicator lights on the keyboard at all - no caps, no num lock, no cool glow. There's no reason to put 2 AA batteries in a keyboard, make it 4 or 8 and give me some indicator lights. They're just little LED's.

Mouse feel is so-so and always seems to be just a little off.

Your BIOS can't see it so if you need to change settings there or if you need to change startup options for XP you need to have a wired keyboard handy.

Setup is a big pain too but you only have to do it once.

Maybe I'll buy version 2 of this but all I can recommend is to stay away from this and get Microsoft's regular wireless desktop which is a very nice product (even if the range is short).

Microsoft should be embarassed.

I've had this product for almost 3 full months and decided I was going to buy another one for home, until I came to the Amazon reviews. I was surprised to see how many people have issues with this keyboard and mouse!

Things I recognize in my set:
1. The mouse does eat batteries, but I work anywhere from 8-12 hours a day, 5 days a week on this set and mouse batteries last 2 weeks usually, and the keyboard batteries last at least a month. I'm using regular copper top brand name batteries. It's all standard office work so it's not like I'm gaming with the mouse or anything, but they do last at least 2 full weeks.

2. It does hibernate if you don't use it for a few min but I find that moving the mouse to the right and left ONCE, or pressing ONE key will wake it up and have it going in less than 2 seconds. That's responsive enough for me.

Things that have never happened (yet..?)
-no keyboard "stickiness" with repeating letters
-no loss of recognition of the devices, they have been very reliable for me

I don't have any other BT periphs so I can't attest to issues with that. I am running XP SP1 and once I did the BT hotfix upon install everything has been great.
I would recommend this to anyone that wants more security and range than RF but doesn't have any other BT devices.

Mistake #1 I originally bought the combo so I could sync my pda since it's a bluetooth device, but MS doesn't include the required bluetooth profiles. Mistake #2 Even though the keyboard and mouse have great designs, the MS Bluetooth transceiver can not function properly with any other Bluetooth transceiver on the computer system. So buying a Bluetooth USB adapter from another company and installing it will not work (its either the Microsoft transceiver or a competing company or neither -- However, bluetooth profiles for the keyboard/mouse combo are not included with competing companies bluetooth usb adapters).

Too make a long story short, at this time, a decision to have a bluetooth wireless keyboard/mouse combo or a different bluetooth usb adapter to allow syncing of pdas and other devices must be made. YOU CAN NOT HAVE BOTH. While installing both devices will work initially, eventually the wireless connection will be lost and more time will be spent unstalling and reinstalling the combo than actually using it. Mama Miah

The good points:
The mouse is ergonomic, has 5 buttons, and once you take a file to some of the sharp mould lines, it feels quite comfy. Both the keyboard and mouse feel (and look) like quality products. Being wireless there are no keyboard or mouse leads to clutter up the desk.

The bad points:
Mouse battery life is less than a week (I'm replacing my NiCad rechargeables every two days!); the keyboard batteries lasts about 6 weeks.
The mouse (and occasionally keyboard) is frequently forgotten by Windows, and has to be manually unisnstalled and re-installed every time this happens. Which is about twice a week.
All of the bad points could be fixed with a software upgrade; Microsoft know about the problems, but haven't released any updated drivers since the product was released.

I wouldn't recommend this to my worst enemy.

It's very simple: if you want a great wireless desktop solution, but don't give a hoot about Bluetooth connectivity, this is the product for you. If you want to ever connect to anything else via Bluetooth, don't even think about it.

I have done hours of Googling looking for a solution to this problem, but have come up with the same result everywhere I go: the Microsoft BT dongle is virtually useless outside of communicating with the mouse and keyboard (and maybe a printer). It seems that many people have had to buy a BT dongle from a 3rd party and throw away the Microsoft dongle.

I feel extremely betrayed by Microsoft's claims of connectivity with this set-up. I just bought a Sony Ericsson T616 with BT, and can't use it with my computer. If you want to connect a phone, don't buy this product!!!

I've had this desktop since it's release and all of the problems listed in the other reviews have happened to me:
1. No keyboard/mouse until Windows loads (no bios support)
2. Slow wake up time (3-5 seconds)
3. The bluetooth receiver always forgets the mouse and keyboard, at least once every other day - this requires unistalling the profile and reinstalling it (which is really fun to do while your keyboard/mouse is missing)
4. If you move the mouse or click the buttons during load the mouse won't be recognized when Windows loads.
5. keyboard will lock when typing and continue to type the same character 100's of times (very annoying)
6. Won't work with my Microsoft Windows Mobile Pocket PC (Tell me that doesn't make sense, Microsoft <-> Microsoft, but it's true)

That being said, I have been using rechargable batteries with my MSBlue desktop and haven't been too hampered by the battery-life. The low battery warnings go off quickly, but the mouse will usually put in a few days after the first warning before cutting out. More importantly, if you're not a "power user" and don't plan on using other bluetooth devices or have any special needs beyond basic mouse/keyboard use, this is one beautiful keyboard.

I'm planning on picking up the new Logitech Cordless MX Duo with Bluetooth (keyboard/mouse) to replace this when it becomes available [includes bluetooth profiles for pocket PC and a mouse charging station] unless Microsoft can produce some better competition in the next few months.

Despite the flaws, it will be hard to part with such a stunning center piece.

Although the description doesn't list Mac compatibility, this keyboard/mouse/Bluetooth combo works great with the built-in Bluetooth functionality of Mac OS X Panther (10.3.x) and Jaguar (10.2.x). You don't need any additional drivers. In fact, it doesn't help at all installing Microsoft's keyboard and mouse drivers from their other Mac-compatible products - this product does not recognize them. The one shortcoming is that the special functionality keys (MSN Messenger button, e-mail button, AV control buttons, etc.) don't work, but let's be real - nobody uses those things anyway. I've used this product in our conference room for about a year and it's still on the same batteries. Way better range and response than the Logitech RF wireless products it replaced. Wish they had this in white or clear! Sorry to hear about Windows users' troubles with drivers and other products like PDAs and phones, but that's what Windows is all about.

Update - April 2007's updated Microsoft Desktop software for Mac now recognizes their Bluetooth keyboards and mice! Also, I was wrong about battery life. Someone had been changing batteries without my knowing. Lasts about a month I'd guess. Working fine on OS X 10.4.9. I had stopped using it since I wanted a white keyboard and I didn't like the non-customization of the mouse buttons when the MS software wasn't working before, and the mouse is a little too grippy on the bottom for my leather mouse pad. The one issue so far is my computer won't stay asleep for long, and it won't go to sleep on its own anymore. The Bluetooth must be keeping the Mac awake, although it shouldn't.

I bought this for my Apple Mac dual 1GHz G4 Quicksilver 2002 machine. I'm using it with the Belkin USB Bluetooth adapter (model F8T003 Version 2). I also did minimal testing thus far with my 15" G4 Al-book 1.25GHz laptop which as bluetooth built-in and found that it works with that as well. My comments below however are my experiences with using the keyboard/mouse on the desktop.

Pros:
In a word it works. However, the only "special" keys that work under OSX are the volume up and down and sleep buttons. I intend to use this with my XP Pro box as well but haven't gotten around to testing that yet. The keyboard itself has a great feel with just a slight "bounce" at the end of the key travel that I really like. It's a fairly quiet keyboard as well (not nearly as "clacky" as the Microsoft Natural wired keyboard a colleague at work uses with his Mac).

Cons:
After OSX boots and the login screen appears, it does take a few seconds for the OS to "see" the mouse - I usually have to move the mouse back and forth on the pad and/or click the buttons to initiate the connection.

The keyboard for its part actually appears to be buffering keystrokes prior to connecting - I'll type in my login password and after about 2 seconds, the characters will rapidly scroll into the password box and I can login. Once the connection with the mouse and keyboard is established, the keyboard has no perceptable delay.

Under RAPID mouse movements though, I have to admit that the mouse pointer motion on the screen isn't as smooth or accurate as a wired USB mouse.

Another slight annoyance with the mouse is that with all the transceiver guts and batteries, the mouse is heavier than my Logitech wired USB mouse. You really notice it at first during drag-lift-move-lower-drag motions whenever you run out of room on your mouse pad. But I found myself getting used to the extra weight after about 3 days of use.

Unknowns:
Battery life? I can't say yet, it's too new. Hopefully, the keyboard and mouse are compatible with lithium AA cells.

Will the "special" keys ever be fully usable under OSX? Don't know yet, I hope so, maybe with some third party or existing system tools this is already possible - I haven't researched it enough yet.

I like the feel of the mouse and the keyboard, BUT I didn't like the idea that I could only use bluetooth to connect the keyboard and the mouse (I have a PocketPC that I like to sync over BT as well).

The supplied transceiver doesn't support anything but the keyboard and mouse. HOWEVER...

I have Belkin's USB bluetooth transceiver which works great. Install the Belkin device and then add the mouse and keyboard as HID devices (this might not be obvious... Use the Bluetooth setup wizard from "My Bluetooth Places".

Everything will work, except you won't have access to the special keys on the keyboard. If you want that as well as battery level tracking, go ahead and install the mouse and keyboard software from the CD included with the keyboard, except: ignore the message about deinstalling existing Bluetooth software and cancel the install when it asks you to connect the supplied MS Bluetooth transceiver. At this point, the keyboard/mouse software has been installed and you don't need the MS bluetooth stuff anyway. In the end, the install takes about 15 min and everything works as it should. PLUS, the belkin transceiver works with everything, including the PocketPC.