A4Tech Battery Free Wireless Optical Mouse

03 JANUARY 2004

A4Tech Battery Free Wireless Optical Mouse

Many people have come to enjoy the freedom from wires by owning a wireless mouse. Almost all wireless mice these days rely on batteries. Rechargeable or not, many people dread the day where their mouse will stop functioning right in the middle of a game or when when working on an important task. Today, we will be taking a look at a wireless optical mouse that immediately sets itself apart from all other wireless mice because it does not use any batteries at all. It is A4Tech's Battery Free Wireless Optical Mouse.

Some of you may immediately be wondering how this mouse can be wireless without the use of any batteries at all. Instead of batteries, the mouse relies on electromagnetic induction technology. If you have ever heard news of being able to recharge an electronic device by just placing it on a special surface, this technology is similar to that.

Packaging/Contents

Everything came in an attractive blue box. The main selling point of the product is immediately indicated with the statement, "No battery required", right in front of the box. Inside the box, there were three pieces: the wireless mouse, the mouse pad, and the installation brochure. This is obviously a very simple package.

A Closer Look at the Mouse and Pad

The mouse is quite simple. It has a black and silver design with the use of clear plastic on the sides and near the scroll wheel. The size of the mouse is quite small making it very portable and ideal for notebook users. The mouse has only three buttons. It has the usual left and right mouse buttons. The third button is in use by pressing the scroll wheel. The scroll wheel is slightly wider than the typical scroll wheel, but, nevertheless has a nice scrolling feel. The left and right mouse buttons don't take much effort to press, but does make a slightly louder clicking noise when a button is pressed. Sometimes, it takes much more effort to press the scroll wheel as a button. In this case, the scroll wheel was easy to press. The bottom of the mouse has four small gliders and the optical sensor right in the center of the mouse. Other than that, there's nothing else to see at the bottom of the mouse.

The pad is the other piece that must be used with the mouse in order to work. The pad's main surface has a silverish color and is very smooth. The top of the pad has LED's which indicate if there is power to the pad and if it is in use. The "Tune" buttons allows you to change the frequency if there is ever a case where the RFID frequencies it uses are interrupted in any way.

Installation

With a Windows XP computer, it was extremely easy to setup the mouse and pad. By just plugging in the pad to my computer, Windows XP detected the device immediately and installed it automatically. After that, the mouse was operational and I was able to move the cursor on the screen with the movement of the mouse.

Performance

When picking up the mouse, I felt that this mouse was one of the lightest wireless mice that I have ever used. Even Logitech's popular MX series mice as well as Microsoft's Intellimouse series mice cannot compete with the weight of this mouse. When using the mice on the pad, I experienced very smooth movement. This is mainly due to the rather smooth surface of the pad. Since the mouse must be used with the provided pad in order to work, this will immediately determine whether this is the right product for the buyer. The use of the pad for one thing prevents switching to a different mouse pad. Mouse pads come in all shapes and sizes these days and those who would like to be able to change their mouse pad may be disappointed with this product.

The size of the pad is reasonable, but could definitely be larger. I would have to say that the pad visually seems to be half the size of a standard 8x11" sheet of paper. That makes it immediately smaller than a typical mouse pad you can buy in the stores.

I was surprised with the performance of this mouse. I was expecting the tracking abilities to be subpar with this kind of technology, but I was proved wrong. Even with quick movements, the mouse was able to keep up. I still can't say that it's as good as Logitech's MX510 or even the MX700, but the performance is still much better than your average cheap wireless mouse.

Conclusion

I was sceptical about A4Tech's Battery Free Wireless Optical Mouse, but I was very surprised with the performance of this product. This product is lightweight and performs rather well. I think this mouse would be great for those who would really like a wireless mouse, but absolutely dread having to change the batteries of a mouse. My only concerns about this product is the rather small pad and the lack of additional buttons. Nevertheless, this is still an excellent product. A4Tech has shown us an innovative new technology for wireless mice and I look forward to them releasing additional products based on this technology. At the price of about $40 on A4Tech's online store, it is comparable to the price of Logitech's lower end wireless mice except without the hassle of batteries.

Reviewed by ronald@digitalreviews.net

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