$70 Cordless Notebook Mouse with No Scroll Wheel

superfloungmous writes "CoolTechZone.com has reviewed Logitech's latest V500 Cordless Notebook Mouse that uses 2.4GHz wireless technology to transmit signal and has a scroll panel instead of a scroll wheel. The concept behind a scroll wheel is you simply move your finger in up, down, left and right directions to use the function. The mouse has a whopping $70.00 price tag as well. Could this be the end of scroll wheels? Here's a quote from the review, "One of the unique things about the V500 is its scroll panel, and this is the very first mouse to actually use this concept. Throughout our testing, we are nothing but impressed with Logitech's new idea. It worked perfectly, and it's actually better than a scroll wheel in many instances. It looks like the era of scroll wheels is short-lived if Logitech applies the same design to its desktop equivalent products."

Re:Pictures?

[closer_neg9]

http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/products/details /US/EN,CRID=3,CONTENTID=9508 [logitech.com]

Laptop touchpads have this as well

[shailesh17]

A similar scroll pad exists on the synaptics touchpad that comes on compaq's presario R3000 laptops - but just does the up/down movements. It works nice but I still prefer the wheel on standard mice cause it provides better control over speed.

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Kinda like this kensington one then?

[Anonymous Coward]

But with a 2D touchpad?
http://www.kensington.com/html/4769.html [kensington.com]

Re:Tactile feedback

[md81544]

I bought a microsoft cordless mouse last year - and the scroll wheel has no "bumps"! I agree with you - it's an odd sensation not having them there. But you do get used to it. It's annoying though when you're playing Counterstrike and you use the scrollwheel to select weapons - you have to be careful not to overshoot the one you wanted.

On the Logitech Site

[lapsan]

Here is a link to the Logitech page about this mouse:

http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/products/details /US/EN,CRID=2146,CONTENTID=9508 [logitech.com]

It doesn't even look like a touchscreen 'scroll' panel as much as a flat button with up, down, left, right capabilities.

They've got a flash online demo of sorts to check out to see how it works. Doesn't even look as "fancy" as the Kensington touchpad mouse people have mentioned.

Re:User preference differ

[chrismcdirty]

I've used a few Thinkpads at my previous job, and I didn't like using the nipple as the mouse. But if you were a fan of the nipple for scrolling, I'd suggest an IBM ScrollPoint II mouse. It makes scrolling easy, as all you have to do is lean the little joystick down or upward, left or right. Made viewing web pages real nice to have an analog control for the scrollbar using only a finger. It's too bad it wasn't more widely supported in games. Many I played didn't even recognize it, and most that did recognize it had it calibrated way to sensitively, to the point where the slightest touch would send my weapons into a frenzy.

Re:sounds like the iPod interface

[DarkSarin]

People like to complain about the price, but remember, kids, that the $70 is from logitech. Newegg has it for $49 (out of stock) and other places have it for as little as $29 (after rebate).

Shop around--you'll get it at a reasonable price. NEVER buy directly from the manufacturer--you pay more, and they make a higher percentage profit off your purchase!

Re:2.4 GHz

[Mr Bill]

Although I know you were going for humour here, I just want to dispell any concerns people might have that take your comments seriously.

I have this mouse, and my Wireless-G router is about a foot and a half away from my mouse, and I have not had any conflicts. It would be silly if Logitech didn't take that into consideration.

As for the quality of this mouse, I have had it for about 5 months now, and it is amazing. I've only replaced the batteries once, and I use it for at least 8 hours a day, and I rarely turn it off. They got the size right as well for a laptop mouse. Not too big, and not impossible to use like those micro mice.

This one is definately worth the high price tag...

Powerbook trackpad / Firefox?

[slthytove]

I assume your browser history problems occur when you are using Firefox, as I had the same problem when I got my new Powerbook. Thinking something was fishy, I investigated a little bit, and it turns out that the behavior is due to (IMHO) a poor choice for default horizontal scrolling behavior in Firefox.

If you want to change Firefox to actually scroll side-to-side, open up Firefox and enter the URL "about:config"

Enter a filter of "mousewheel" so you're only seeing settings relating to the mousewheel.

Set mousewheel.horizscroll.withnokey.action to 0 (the default value is 2, I believe). You may also want to try adjusting the values of mousewheel.horizscroll.withnokey.numlines and mousewheel.withnokey.numlines to get a more comfortable feel for how screens scroll in Firefox (and make sure to set the .sysnumlines values for each of those to "false," otherwise your changes won't have any effect).

After I got those settings fixed, I found scrolling with the Trackpad in Firefox to be quite handy, though for some reason it still seems touchier than Safari. Oh well - I guess not enough of Firefox's developers are Powerbook users, and I lack the initiative to make a positive change.

Re:Powerbook trackpad / Firefox?

[FuzzyBad-Mofo]

Here's what worked for me with Powerbook trackpad + Firefox:

1. go to about:config
2. set mousewheel.horizscroll.withnokey.action = 0
3. set mousewheel.withnokey.sysnumlines = false
4. set mousewheel.horizscroll.withnokey.numlines = 1

Re:Whatever happened to BlueTooth?

[doombob]

Have you ever tried to develop any kind of hardware to use Bluetooth wireless? It's not fun or easy. In one of my senior design classes, we tried to implement wireless sensors that would use Bluetooth to communicate with each other and a base station, and it was next to impossible. We spent most of the year trying to get the Bluetooth to transmit the data we wanted correctly rather than working on any other part of the project. Our professor still gave us an A since he felt sorry for us.

This thing SUCKS

[Jakobud]

I got this a few weeks ago interested in the unique features it offered. What a waste of money. I hated it almost immediately.

Ergonomnics - The shape of it is like a small box. About as non-ergonomic as you can get. Convinced that it was 'cool' product that I just had to ease myself into, I forced myself to use it and got used to the weird shape after a few days. But my hand began to hurt pretty easily from being in such an akward grip all the time.

Scroll Pad - The whole 'scroll pad' thing.... Not a good idea... It's interesting and new and unique, but if Logitech replaces all their scroll wheels with these things I'd have to start buying other mice. I had an incredibly difficult time with it in some cases. It is good for scrolling up or down on long documents or webpages. But it is HORRIBLE for when you need precision scrolling. Like if you know you need to move the scroll wheel up exactly 3 "clicks", it is virtuall impossible, unless you get lucky.

EXAMPLE - You are playing some FPS game and you use the scroll wheel/pad to change weapons. You are using the pistol and you have to scroll up 2 "clicks" to get to the shotgun. With this mouse, GOOD LUCK!. You will either overshoot or undershoot almost everytime and end up with the wrong weapon in your hand. Impossible.

COLLAPSING - A cool unique feature is that the wireless receiver can fit into the bottom of the mouse and it collapses upon itself for easy storage/travel. A cool idea that works very well.

NO MIDDLE MOUSE BUTTON - I use the middle mouse button all the time in my field of work and can't use this mouse without it. Logitech decided it was a good idea to get rid of it for some reason. Probably cause making a clickable scroll pad was too complicated. Anyways, BAD MOVE.

Overall I give this mouse a 3/10 (10 being the best). I like the collapsing feature, but there are too many other problems with it. Too uncomfortable, scroll wheel too difficult to work with, and no middle mouse button.

In my opinion, if you want a really great and comfortable mouse, buy the Logitech MediaPlay mouse. I own 3 of these things for my computers. It's wireless. Perfect for either left or right handed folks. Very ergonomic. And the wireless is very responsive. IMHO this is the best mouse Logitech has released since the original 3-button MouseMan many years ago...

Re:Iffy ergonomics....

[Anonymous Coward]

"... as they encourage unnatural movements of the middle finger while holding the rest of the fingers static."

Not for us with girlfriends...

Re:Iffy ergonomics....

[toddestan]

First up, scroll wheels are a Bad Thing to start off with as they encourage unnatural movements of the middle finger while holding the rest of the fingers static.

I don't know about you, but I always use my index finger to scroll the scroll wheel on my mouse. Never really gave it any thought, it just seems natural to me. The only thing the middle finger is used for is right clicks.

Re:Iffy ergonomics....

[redd robber]

Do people use their middle finger on the scroll wheel? I use my index finger on the scroll button, shifting it to the left button when I need to click left. My middle finger is used for the right button.

Maybe because I started with a two button mouse?

Is this better ergonomically?

Maybe this is also why I suck at counterstrike?

Too many questions,

Redd

Other use for a finger...

[Anonymous Coward]

Both my wife and GF really like it when I make unnatural movements with one particular finger while leaving the others more or less static... can be highly useful from time to time.

AC to protect my domestic situation !