Microsoft's Wireless Optical Desktop Elite offers users a lot of freedom, but the same old niggles resurface in this new design. Read our Australian review.
If you've never used a wireless keyboard and mouse combo before, it's not what you'd expect. While the freedom to move the keyboard to your lap is an advantage, it's really the savings in desktop clutter that justifies such a hefty investment. It really is quite amazing how much space can be re-claimed by getting rid of only two cables.
While the mobility aspect is appealing, the Wireless Optical Desktop Elite is really only useful for certain activities. When working in a word processor, for example, it's quite nice to be able to lean back with your feet on a milk-crate tapping away. If on the other hand you fancy some wireless couch browsing, forget it. You really need to use the mouse as well, which unless you're wearing hard, flat, plastic pants, means continually moving back to a solid surface.
Installation of the Optical Desktop Elite couldn't be simpler; Just plug it in, press the button on the receiver, then the "connect" button on the keyboard and mouse and most modern versions of Windows should pick it up. To get the special keys working you'll need to install the supplied software.
The Elite keyboard has a nice springy feel to it, and it's quiet. The layout follows Microsoft's usual slightly weird layout for the cluster of page up/down home/end and delete keys, which have a vertical rather than horizontal layout. It doesn't take a lot of getting used to, but we wonder why Microsoft bothered to change it in the first place.
As with most high-end keyboards, the Elite Keyboard boasts a number of custom keys that can be used to launch any application the user desires. By default they're naturally tied to Microsoft applications -- the audio controls default to Windows Media Player, for example.
One of the silliest features of this keyboard is the F Lock function. It enables you to use the F keys to perform simple functions when it's locked. F2 becomes undo, F3 redo, F6 close etc. These simple functions are very easily performed with control/alt commands anyway, so experienced users will simply leave it switched off all the time. The Elite keyboard also suffers from having no LEDs, so it's impossible to tell if F Lock is activated or not simply by looking at the keyboard. There would have been definite benefits in making the F-Lock button into a switch rather than a standard key.
Like the rest of Microsoft's newer hardware range, the Elite keyboard has a scroll wheel on the side of the keyboard that can be used to scroll horizontally and vertically. In our experience it was a neat feature, but of little practical use, especially considering the bundled mouse also has a scroll wheel with exactly the same feature set.
As for the mouse, it's sleek and black, like the keyboard, and not built for the left-handed among us. It comes with back/forward thumb buttons as well as the usual two buttons and scroll wheel that, like the keyboard, can be used for scrolling horizontally as well as vertically.
Battery life is always a concern with wireless devices, and Microsoft claims that improvements in its wireless technology should allow for up to six months battery life for the mouse alone, although this was a considerable period longer than our test window allowed. Likewise, the company claims that its wireless peripherals are less prone to interference from other wireless devices than they used to be. While we hit few problems in our testing, it's all but impossible to say if that was due to improvements in the technology, or just something that would have happened in any case.
As the top of Microsoft's particular hardware range, the Wireless Optical Desktop Elite isn't cheap. At AU$229.95 there are certainly cheaper options out there, making the Optical Desktop Elite only of real interest for people who spend a long time in front of their computer and want something with luxurious stylings.
Microsoft Wireless Optical Desktop Elite
Company: Microsoft
Price: AU$229.95
Distributor: Selected resellers
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