The keys, in comparison to my last keyboard are completely silent as they are based on Microsoft’s quiet touch research, whilst my Logitech had clattery sounding keys. The keys are grouped perfectly together too, which makes it a boon for touch typists like me. The need for unnecessary finger travel isn’t bad at all and touch typing isn’t a stressful experience, although I do find that left SHIFT key a bit too small. As an added bonus the keyboard features a sleek cushioned leather palm rest. I am not a fan these rests at all, especially a leather one which will get dirt and grime building up in any vacant areas in no time at all. Sadly from what I can see, there isn’t any way of removing the rest at all.
Now let’s look at the extra buttons on this thing. To the far left of the keyboard you will find a large group of customisable buttons, which launch various pre-defined applications. There are a pair of forward/back buttons for your browser, a ‘zoom’ button that doesn’t seem to function as a zoom but rather as up/down ala the cursor keys and lastly there is a gadgets button that is meant to give you one touch access to Gadgets such as weather information, news, updates etc by default, however in Vista this seems to launch the Windows Vista Sidebar application.
The top row of the keyboard houses the media keys, as well as the customisable hot keys and mute/volume up and down buttons. The media keys seem to work with any media application, and right now I’m using it without any problems playing back videos on Zoom Player. Windows Media Player 11 is obviously supported too, and works without any issues. The hotkeys used in conjunction with Intellitype are superb. They work like radio preset buttons, just hold a button down while on a webpage, or somewhere within Explorer for instance and you’ll hear a bell sound as it is saved, and can be recalled by just tapping that button. Simply brilliant! Pressing the Star button to the far right of these hotkeys invokes the hotkey shortcut window, which shows you what you have assigned to the five keys.
To the top right of the keyboard you have three features to note. A button that launches the MS Calculator application, a Log Off button and a small battery shaped green LED light, which I assume will light up when the keyboard is low on battery power. Every single extra button on this keyboard can be reprogrammed via the IntelliType application. How good is that? I have wanted to do this on Logitech keyboards for years, and yet Microsoft manages to do this in one small, compact Control Panel applet.
Each button can be re-programmed to launch an application/web page, or you can choose from a rather list of pre-configured commands. What more can you ask for?
Well, I could ask for one feature…Put the bloody Caps/Num/Scroll Lock LED lights on the sodding keyboard Microsoft! Those eagle eyed readers amongst you have already noticed that there aren’t any of those lights on the keyboard itself - they’re on the receiver unit, which is a bit pointless.
Rodent Issues
Microsoft has seen fit to include the Wireless Laser Mouse 6000 in this package. In my opinion the only decent mouse they have built was the original Microsoft Intellimouse Explorer, which they have recently re-released. This mouse was a legendary performer and possibly the best mouse I have used since my current Logitech MX518. Microsoft’s Desktop mice however, have always been of a poor standard for quite a while. Their build quality and ergonomics have been second to none as always, but performance has always failed to live up to expectations. Upon purchasing this keyboard/mouse package, I knew where this mouse would be going - into my cupboard of useless PC hardware.
