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Bluetooth Mouse with USB Adapter

Bluetooth Mouse with USB Adapter

List Price: $79.99
Your Price: $70.99
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Pretty good on OS X
Review: Although there's no documentation about OS X, it's simple to set this thing up (in 10.3.3): just open the Keyboard & Mouse preferences, choose Bluetooth, and click "Set up new device..." and push the connect button on the bottom of the mouse.

And while there's no OS X support for the third (thumb) button, you're still a right-click and a scroll wheel ahead of Apple's own Bluetooth mouse offering... for less money.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Trivial mac install, extremely poor OSX compatibility
Review: The lack of documentation was no surprise, nothing has MAC documentation and that's ok. The install was pretty easy. I took the mouse out of the box, turned it on and clicked the bluetooth icon on my Mac to do the pairing. Configuring the side and scroll buttons to drive expose was also trivial. However...

The connection is intermittent. I get the "connection list" warning every 15-30 seconds. The mouse may or may not be connected after a 30-45 second pause to type (much like I am doing now) and may or may not require a few seconds to reconnect. Its not usable. So I changed the batteries and fideled around with my Bluetooth settings. No joy. I even rebotted my Mac. Still no joy.

When Belkin cares about the Mac market enough to include documentation, I'll care about their product enough to figure out how to use it. I mean, its almost as bad as open source software: it might work if you set it up right, but there's no documentation. Until then, it goes back to the store and I am back to either a bluetooth one button mouse or another wireless standard.

Update:

I went back and bought the Microsoft wireless mouse. Its not bluetooth, so its not as handy with my PowerPook with built-in Bluetooth, but it works and has 3 buttons!

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Poor Macintosh OSX Compatibility
Review: Zero documentation for installation and setup on Mac -- I had to download a PDF from their website and ultimately email Belkin Tech Support for help.

Once I got the mouse basically working, I asked them how to configure the various buttons. Out of the box, the side button does nothing. Belkin told me "We don't have any special software to program the buttons but you may be able to find a third-party application"!! Clearly their Mac OSX support is an afterthought. My advice: Wait and buy one that really IS compatible.


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