Microsoft Intellimouse Explorer

Rating:
Summary: Almost perfect
Review: I spent alot of time looking for a good optical mouse. I looked at prices, features, number of buttons, etc. I decided to go for the Microsoft Intellimouse Explorer based on the location of the extra buttons. At first it felt kind of light in my hand and it took a little bit of time getting used to the extra buttons. But now that I have used it for a while I love it! The extra buttons are programable and are placed in the perfect spots. I use one to copy and the other one to paste. The optical eye never misses a beat, you get precise pointing everytime. The only thing I wish is that they would of made it a little heavier, the plastic is pretty light and the texture could also have more grip. Other than that it is an excellent product.

Rating:
Summary: Perfect for 18 months then multiple problems.
Review: I bought my corded Intellimouse Explorer 3.0 for use on a PC with Windows ME. For the first 18 months it worked great then all of a sudden began having multiple problems.

PROS:
1) Excellent tracking resolution, never lets the cursor skip or jump. Can make tiny moves smoothly. The bottom of the mouse moves smoothly and I've never had to clean the surface contacts.
2) Comfortable ergonomic shape. My hand doesn't get tired after a day of mousing.
3) The extra buttons are well placed and easy to program to do whatever I need them to do (wish there were even more buttons!).

CONS:
1) The scroll wheel was never easy to roll, but after about a year it became nearly impossible to use. Hard to roll, as if it was stuck or dirty. It wasn't dirty on the outside, but I couldn't open the mouse to see if it needed cleaning on the inside. I have to press down so hard to get the wheel to turn now that the wheel button engages instead. The scroll wheel is supposed to move freely with little resistance, instead now its almost useless.
2) Recently the left-click button started registering a double-click every other time I single-click. This is some sort of mechanical problem, since it happens no matter what I set the sensitivity to, and at any rate I'm not clicking any differently than I ever have. This is a major annoyance and renders the mouse basically useless.
3) A $50 dollar mouse (at the time of purchase) should last longer than 18 months. I use it mostly for typical office work. Although I do gaming with it as well, I do not consciously abuse my equipment. Perhaps the gaming causes extra stress on a mouse, but I've never had cheap $20 mice go kaput with the same kind of use.

All in all, though this mouse has nice features, I couldn't recommend this model, although more recent versions may have been improved. I have to replace this one now, and although I have nothing against Microsoft in general and usually look at Microsoft products first, I will be trying a Logitech mouse next (for the first time).

Rating:
Summary: Nice looking and good performance not very confortable.
Review: I bought this product in order to change my old "ball" mouse. Pro's:
1.Packaging is great and amazon deliverd it on time and well protected. 2. It has FIVE buttons. 3. It comes with great software and drivers that let's you personalize the buttons to do every job you want. 4. It's silver modern design in combination with the red light looks cool!!!5. the price is good for the quality and looks of the product that you get.

Con's:

Ergonimics. It is not as comfortable as other ergo mouses in the market. My aedvice get a mouse pad with a gel wrist rest ...P>PS if you run WIN XP t\you'll need to update the drivers from microsoft site.

Rating:
Summary: I totally despise Microsoft, but this mouse is an exception¡­
Review: Quite a good mouse, I've owned about five or six mice over the years, the only ones that haven't broken are this one and another microsoft home one.

If you still don't own a mouse with a scroll-wheel (how could you not?) then get one - because you won't ever go back. The optical feature isn't bad either - no more sticky balls or moving parts!

I like having the extra buttons, but the wheel button is a bit of a joke, I found I kept accidentally pressing it when I wanted to just scroll down the page - so I deactivated it. If you do set this button, better make it for something relatively unimportant like showing the desktop. I set the small "thumb" button for that task, and the larger thumb button for double clicking (but that makes your other finger very lazy indeed!).

The software is very good; you can set all sorts of things like pointer acceleration, pointer speed, and pointer trails. But the feature I like most of all is this: you can set the orientation, so that if you hold your mouse at a bit of an angle relative to the edge of the table, it will correct for this. Don't quite understand? No one holds their mouse perfectly in line with their arm, so when they want to move the cursor on the screen horizontally to the right, they actually have to move the mouse to the right but also at an angle away from you towards the computer to compensate for the way they hold the mouse. Still don't believe me? Try it: move your mouse parallel to the edge of the desk, and the chances are that your curser will move diagonally right and down. It is a very clever feature, and this is something that you won't realise you've been doing all these years until you get this mouse, use it for a while, and then go back to an old one.

Rating:
Summary: I'd rather not support MS , but I really like this mouse
Review: I love my Optical Explorer Mouse! Besides for the extremely nice optical feature, I find the back and forward buttons very useful and I use 'em all the time. I also really like how smoothly the wheel scrolls up and down. I find Logitec wheels to jump lines no matter how many lines I set it to. I've used Logitec Mice on my computer before and until I had tried MS's mouse I didn't know how smooth scrolling could be. All five buttons of this mouse can be set to whatever you like. I set my wheel button to double-click (since I double-click often), which I also find *very* useful. I've had this mouse for almost 2-years now and have not had a 2nd problem with it. My 1st problem was my own ID10T error. I have two gripes about this mouse though: (1)it's a bit on the large side, and (2)I wish I had it in wireless! :D

Rating:
Summary: A great mouse for work
Review: I purchased this model about 3 months ago for use at my place of business where it is not unusual to spend 6-8 hours mousing through Excel tables, emails...
It has been both reliable and comfortable even on the busiest of days. Note that the scroll wheel DOES NOT click or have any graduations as some do, so scrolling is smooth as silk. This may be a drawback for some users, but I find it comfortable and intuitive. The tilt feature of the scroll wheel is a bit clunky -- using it usually causes me to inadvertantly press the scroll wheel button -- but it IS useful if you work with wide spredsheet tables or other documents/files requiring left-to-right scrolling.
The only drawback I've noted so far (and the reason I rated it at 4 stars) is the setup. In my book it's not plug & play if you've got to load software, and that's exactly what you must do to enable all of this mouse's features. No big deal.
I've enjoyed using this product and have had no problems with it's operation so far. I recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: Same problem as Tinderbox in spotlight review
Review: It worked really well and I was totally satisfied with this mouse until several months ago. (which means, after two years of usage)
The problem slowly came up to the surface.
Single click was started to be recognized as a double click.
I'm kind of getting sense on how much pressure on the left mouse button determines single click or double click.
If I press the button very lightly, it register as single click.
If I press little bit harder, it takes it as double click.
In scroll button case, they are reverted.
Press scroll button hard makes single click and lighter makes double click.
Now, I'm sick of it (since numerous times a day, I launch wrong application because of that double click problem), and considering buying logitech MX300

Rating:
Summary: Was a great optical until it stopped working
Review: Well I did use my mouse for UT2003 as one reviewer noted use
but i found it was rather heavy for online gaming and noticable lag on making turns PLUS THIS THING EATS BATTERIES like crazy
however the ergonomics are top notch
I still use it for net surfing
but the thumb buttons have all stopped working
and I have gone back to my trusty ball mouse for gaming

Rating:
Summary: Not as comfortable as the Logitech MX500
Review: Microsoft still doesn't know how to make PC mice fit in your hand. It's a better fit than their first optical baseball, but the Logitech MX500 [got it from Amazon of course] is more comfortable.

Rating:
Summary: Best Mouse In the World
Review: My Intellimouse is one of the older ones with the larger side buttons. I have had it for 3 years now and have had no problems with it. This mouse has probably been abused beyond belief compared to what some of the other reviews here have done with it. I play games with the mouse because the extra buttons are so helpful. Due to my nature of banging sometimes when I get frustrated my mouse has been slammed a few times and has survived those too. I was reading the reviews, ignore most the poor reviews. They are people who need to update USB drivers or need to use their mouse on a survive that has better reflective properties.