Microsoft Wireless Desktop 900

Honestly, its a pretty bad set – Mouse is a bit laggy Runs on 2.4ghz signal so can have problems due to wifi signal. Keys are a bit small for a full sized keyboard. Keys are bit tough to push in, not light and easy.

Better Than I expected From A Microsoft Hardware – While I generally gravitate towards Logitech input devices, I couldn't find any that weren't overpriced. $120-$200 for a keyboard? Gimme a break. I've spent less on whole computers than that. So after a bit of trial and error I think I found a combo that I like. A lot of people these days use laptops with shorter key stroke and soft keys. I'm not one for these Ergonomic keyboards as I tend to dance around a bit on the keyboard. I can still type at about 50WPM, half cut and left to my own devices! This keyboard/mouse is essentially plug & play. Plug the dongle in and it works. You can download the Microsoft Mouse & Keyboard centre for some extra functionality. Initially when installing it failed. But upon a reboot, didn't have any issues installing. The keyboard is VERY comfortable. No "weird" key locations to mis-key. There's some extra hard keys include which are nice: Calculator key, start/stop music, volume controls and mute The mouse (while I generally prefer larger mouses because I have larger hands) is pretty comfortable and responsive. There's also a "weight" to it, so it feels sturdy (not like some of the cheaper mouses). I would have preferred to have an extra two side buttons. It's a shame you can't just buy this keyboard and separate mouse. The only downsides I see is - No lights for caps or numlock keys, which is a bit of a pain - No indication of the standard function keys "actual" functions. - The dongle sticks out a fair way (like a USB wifi adapter) Overall, I'm pretty happy with the combo and even replaced my old mouse with this one, saving on one dongle. I'd give it 5 stars if Microsoft addressed those two concerns above.

Compact and useful but sacrifices comfort – This is a simple product that pretty much does what it says it does. It's a solid keyboard and mouse with excellent battery life that Just Works. Having to open the mouse battery case to get the USB dongle is a little bit of a pain, but makes it nice and secure and keeps it free from dust. The spring-loaded pop-out ones tend to get lost or break. So I'm OK with it.

Pros:

* Compact, light, thin keyboard,

* Strong enough to cope with being carted around in a backpack all day

* Shallow keys are resistant to getting caught on things and damaged

* Full key layout with numpad

* The mouse is big enough to be comfortable and works great

* Seriously cheap but not built cheap

Cons:

* The keyboard takes AAA batteries but mouse takes AA, which is annoying.

* No spacing between ` and ESC, or F12 and [calc], or grouping of F-keys, makes it too easy to fat-finger the wrong button. It's a reasonable price to pay for the compact layout.

* There's no power switch on the keyboard, it's always-on and just uses deep powersave when no keys are pressed. This works poorly if you carry it around because it'll inevitably get squashed, bumped, stuck with a key pressed etc. The keyboard does not come with any sort of hard plastic cover you can clip over the face to protect the keys and prevent this, so it should at least have a power switch. I work around this by popping a keyboard battery out when I put the keyboard away, but that's a bit of a pain. The keyboard should have a power switch.

If the keyboard had a power switch and came with even a cheap nylon sleeve, or preferably a clip-on cover for the keys, I'd give it 5 stars. As it is, it gets 4 stars because it's cheap and reliable. Microsoft Hardware wins again.