Review on Microsoft Wireless Comfort Desktop 5050 Black Keyboard and Mouse (PP4-00001) by Kevin Mitchell

I wanted to like this keyboard but it's hard to recommend. I have an old wireless MS keyboard, 850, with a 1000 series mouse. I really miss the back button on the mouse, so I "upgraded". This keyboard is full of junk. The extra keys to the left of the tilde and above the F-line make me angrily look down to press the right key. What world needs a dedicated email key on the keyboard? Most users default to Outlook, which is awkward to navigate with a mouse, but even worse without one. So the user has to keep using the mouse. So, clicking on the email icon, which by default is located in the taskbar in Win10, is already more useful and intuitive than if it was next to the ESCAPE key. The F-keys are too small and very poorly placed, another thing I need to look down and check. Most keyboards have them in groups of 4 so they're evenly spaced. My old 850 model has the same complaint, but at least on this keyboard it doesn't have a row of extra keys above the F row grouped like the F row on a regular keyboard. The mouse is unnecessarily wide and clumsy, and the scroll wheel sucks. I have decent sized hands and this thing is just awkward to hold. The mouse wheel is ridiculously sensitive. I've tried dozens of mice over the years, there's no feedback or clicks on that wheel, and adjusting the volume in something like VLC is downright difficult. What would normally be a slight increase or decrease is simply multiplied by 3-4x. So it goes from barely audible to loud with barely perceptible touch and vice versa. Scrolling through webpages or folders looks fine, as far as I can tell these programs ignore the extra wheel speed like it has 2-3x less sensor distance for no reason. Switching weapons with the mouse wheel in games is just a hassle because it keeps going wrong. Have you ever come across high-end gaming mice with extremely responsive refresh settings that offer extremely stuttering gaming experience? Yes, take this "feature" and imagine it on the mouse wheel. In addition, this mouse reacts strangely sluggishly to the cursor. It's almost like a drug through honey or something. I don't have this problem with the 850 series, but the LED sensor on the bottom of the old mouse is red. This newer 1000 model has some blue light. I don't know if this is to make it more comparable across more surfaces, or if it's updating less frequently for better battery life, or what's happening. Honestly it's annoying and I only speak in Windows while navigating my desktop. I wouldn't even attempt to use it extensively in game, and I'm not even an avid gamer. Materials for assembling this set too. disgusting. The matte plastic on the palm rest looks constantly worn and dirty to the touch, and the glossy, reflective plastic around the keys is a fingerprint magnet. Obviously it was a design choice to look sleek and cool for the luxury multimedia market it was aimed at, but in practice it needs constant cleaning and practically polishing if you don't want it to look dirty. It reminds me of phones, those thousands of dollar handhelds that are sold to look too slick, which makes them unnecessarily slippery and annoying when they need to be slipped into a protective case asap, which totally sucks and lack of functionality disrupts a smoothness that is there only to appear brilliant. Do you know how often I see a closeup of my phone's features? All that sleek design and detail used to showcase rotating product videos in slow-motion close-ups? Never. This is pointless nonsense. I don't know anyone who sits there and stares obsessively at the sleek design of their phone, but that's what you've been taught to sell. I just want a reliable keyboard and mouse. I just want a simple, reliable product. I can find cheap wired basic Dell keyboards lying around for free like a tank. Nothing flashy, works great. As soon as I try to connect to a wireless network, I pay for shiny junk. It's been like this for 20 years and it's still stupid. The radio band is still completely down or skipped. The sensor for this is 3 feet away, but as soon as my body or another laptop comes between that location line, it keeps shutting down and its batteries are fresh. These are very limited frequency bands that they can use and are geared towards low power consumption for the laptop market and battery life. It was "appropriate" and people just tweaked their stuff to make it work. This is new as WiFi demands are always pushing for more speed. That's enough to stop investing to do better, a classic product of capitalism. i give it back The main benefit for me is the built-in wireless encryption. Logitech has never shown any interest in security, and the MouseJack and BlueJack hacks have been around for years. Microsoft tries to interfere at least sometimes. I could look at Revain Basics clones of this theme with similar built-in encryption, but there are many reviews of how quickly their writing wears off.