Microsoft Wireless Entertainment Desktop 8000 (Light Silver)
See it at Amazon.com for $229.00Average Customer Rating
(3.5 out of 5)
Amazon Customer Reviews
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(5 out of 5)4.5 Stars
After using this keyboard, I can say that it's almost perfect.
The nicest feature on this keyboard is the backlit keys. Every key and button is evenly lit in a soft white light. The backlight activates as soon as your hands get within about an inch of the keyboard. It dims, brightens, or shuts off depending on the light level of the room. You can also set it to never come on, or to go straight to maximum brightness once you begin using it, regardless of the light level. Plus it looks great.
The touch pad on the keyboard is more functional than you would think given its size, but it's no replacement for a mouse or even a normal laptop touchpad. It's more useful in the directional pad mode for controlling Media Center.
The included software (which had to be updated) caused my computer to hang a few times while I was installing it, and also forced me to install that annoying "Validation Tool" before I could download another update for the Bluetooth driver. You can probably skip this and just download the software update if you want, because it has no noticeable impact on performance.
The function keys on the top of the keyboard are touch-strips and not actual buttons. It definitely looks nice, but it's pretty easy to accidentally touch one and trigger it while you're trying to hit a number key, before you get used to the layout. That being said, you'll get used to the layout pretty fast coming from a normal keyboard. It's ergonomic and comfortable without being too much of a shock. The biggest changes are that there is no number pad, and the Windows key is now in the bottom center of the keyboard with a "function" key is in its place.
The mouse that comes with the keyboard is the Wireless Laser Mouse 8000. It works well enough and is very accurate. The scroll wheel is the smooth scrolling type, so there's no real tactile feedback when you scroll. At first I didn't like it, but now I actually like it better than a normal scroll wheel. It has an "accelerated scrolling" feature that allows you to scroll rapidly or very slowly depending on how fast you spin the wheel. The side buttons are in strange (uncomfortable) locations though.
As far as wireless performance goes, there is no lag from either the mouse or the keyboard. The mouse takes about half a second to wake up if you haven't used it for a few minutes, but the keyboard has a proximity sensor so it will normally wake up before you even touch it. Neither the mouse nor the keyboard have dropped their connections once.
If there's one thing I really didn't like, it's that the documentation that came with the keyboard is pretty sparse. It comes with a quick start guide, and a "manual" that reads more like an advertisement. The manual also gives you a link to go to in order to "learn more" about the keyboard, but the link just sends you to a flash version of the same advertisement-like manual you just read.
Aside from a few minor flaws, this keyboard and mouse set is excellent. I would definitely recommend it, especially to anyone who uses Media Center on a HTPC, because this is where it's features really shine.
(1 out of 5)Expensive keyboard with lots not to like about
Overall it has a lot of nice features that you'd expect from a $250 keyboard+mouse set. Read the marketing description if you want to fall in love with this product, which I did. I am sure you can read about all the nice things about this keyboard above. I'll just mention the issues, the ones that they left out in the product description, intentionally or unintentionally.
Issues:
1. the surface of the keyboard is very easily scratched. The keys looks like soft plastic with metallic paint, they scratches terribly easily. For the shiny aluminum look, they should have thought about the scratch issues, I've only had the keyboard for 2 days and I already have 3 very obvious scratches, 2 on keys and one at the top of the keyboard near the charging contacts.
2. driver software needs some work. While installing in Vista x86 went relatively smoothly, I do not understand why the installation would ask you to reconnect your keyboard and mouse since they are already connected. What was Microsoft driver team thinking? If that was ok for Vista x86, installing in Vista x64 was a pure disaster. Each software (intellipoint and intellitype, both freshly downloaded form Microsoft) asked for mouse and keyboard to be re-connected, and reconnected again!!! After rebooting, the mouse works, but keyboard shows connected but something wrong with the passkey. It took a total of 5 reconnects of both mouse and keyboard to get it working in Vista x64. Someone ought to get fired at Microsoft for this.
3. the magnifying function is ridiculous, it flashes and disables the Vista Aero interface before showing up. Why does it need to do that?
4. Escape key is at a weird place, and I accidentally hit F1 every time I want to hit Escape. There is a Fn key where Windows key normally is, the round windows key at the bottom of the keyboard is nice and OK but why can't there be a windows key where one is expected? Such design makes Windows key combinations more tedious to execute such as Windows-E, Windows-R, maybe the designer of the keyboard is not smart enough to be aware of such combinations (hint they are published on MS website). The lack of numeric keypad is a hassle at times, whether doing number cruching or running video game trainers.
5. the backlit keys are OK, but the light is too soft. Using the brightness adjustment and setting to max still only yield a very soft back light. Do not expect them to light up your dark room for you.
6. The touch pad (the area to the top right of the keyboard with 4 directional and an OK button in the middle) works OK but does not work like a typical touch pad. The speed of movement is rather unpredictable, and trying to "click" with the touch pad is error-prone.
7. There is a back button but not a forward button.
8. The media center key always lauches the Media Center in full screen mode. And that key does not show up under keyboard control panel for you to change its behavior. Again, what is Microsoft thinking?! Being able to run Media Center in normal window mode vs full-screen was one of the features they boasted for Vista and the damn keyboard took it all away.
9. The included rechargeable battery is 2000mAh Energizer, not my favorite brand when it comes to rechargeable battery (read reviews of these batteries on Amazon), Microsoft should've done some research on the batteries.
10. the charging stand when in contact with the keyboard makes a faint but definitive high-pitched noise. I can make it go away by re-seating it on top of the keybaord, but it is still somewhat audible now that you know it is there. It feels like some sort of vibration that's causing the noise.
I can keep going. Don't get me wrong, I still like this keyboard/mouse set and am not returning it, not yet at least. But they do annoy me. Oh by the way, the mouse works perfectly and feels heavy (which I like) and very accurate. No complaints there. The keyboard could use lot of improvement. Is anyone at Microsoft reading this? Send me a new set of keys if you are (need 5 and 9 for now). These scratched keys are such an eye sore, and I swear I do not even remember scratching them with anything. I've never managed to scratch a keyboard in my whole life until now.
(5 out of 5)Just what I was looking for
I've had mine for 10 days and it's just what I was looking for. It's not a gaming keyboard and there's no numeric keypad, but this should be clear from all the information readily available.
To understand why I waited all year for this to be released, I need to say something about my room setup. First, there's no ceiling light; there are 2 lamps and they are situated on the opposite wall. The room is large and light from those lamps barely illuminates the computer desk. For a long time I've resorted to a Kensington USB FlyLight to view the keys on my keyboard.
For this reason alone backlighting was the Number One priority on my keyboard shopping list. Early this year I read about the 8000 on Gizmodo and to my surprise Microsoft had not only added backlighting, but everything else:
1) Bluetooth wireless connectivity.
2) Proximity sensor to preserve battery life particularly with backlighting turned on.
3) Ambient light sensor.
4) Slightly curved ergonomic design (better than the 'wave' in my opinion).
5) A well thought-out charging cradle into which both the keyboard and mouse can be stylighly plugged in at the same time.
6) A USB Bluetooth Dongle that plugs into a USB port on the charging cradle; the cradle plugs into your computer via USB 2.0.
7) They even threw in an extra USB port on the charging cradle!
The keyboard also has the usual gamut of multimedia and special function keys, and there's no issue with wake-from-sleep for me! The keyboard buffers your keystrokes and all of them appear on the computer after a second or two (again, this is for wake-from-sleep).
However, nothing is perfect and there are a few ways Microsoft can improve the product:
1. The plastic housing is lightweight and reasonably sturdy, but not as rigid as Apple's new aluminum keyboard. If build quality is important to you, I would rate this as 8.0 whereas Apple's would be a 9.5.
2. The Esc, Home, and End keys are not full keys, but thin horizontal lines. It takes a little time to acclimate one's fingering to these oft-used keys. They don't press down so there's no tactile feedback; you just have to watch the screen for assurance that the key was pressed.
3. The 4 arrow keys are narrower than usual and again require a little patience and practice.
4. I had a little trouble with the Bluetooth setup wizard. I consider myself a power user (with a lot of previous experience in pairing Bluetooth devices), but there were some initial pairing pains with the mouse. After a couple of reboots and reconnection attempts (holding down the 'connect' button on the cradle and keyboard/mouse) everything connected properly and since then has remained perfectly stable.
5. The documentation is entirely online in the form of the old non-browser-based Help dialog. There are various blinking lights on the mouse and keyboard, in both red and green. If you want to know what they mean (for example, to know when the battery is fully charged), you have no choice but to find the answer buried in the online Help.
Despite these shortcomings, I am extremely satisfied with this product despite its price. The backlighting is a godsend.
(1 out of 5)Severe keyboard latency- DO NOT BUY
Keyboard goes into sleep mode to preserve battery life but does not respond to keystrokes until you have typed 7- letters and even then most letters do not appear on screen. I have spent hours on the phone with Microsoft and was called by a senior technician today who informed me that it is a major problem that they are aware of and that they have no date to correct. He acknowledged he was having the same problem with his hardware. He also stated that was spending most of his day dealing with this problem. Very frustrating, since it is the coolest keyboard I have ever used.
(4 out of 5)Great looking keyboard...key layout is not for gamers or programmers
This is cool looking keyboard. It has a variable light backlit keyboard, which adjusts automatically based on the lighting in the room. The curved keyboard is easy to use and takes very little adjusting. The recharging feature of the keyboard is nice as well. It takes standard AA batteries and comes with 4 energizer rechargable batteries.
This is a keyboard for a person that a) has money to blow on cool things, since it is the most expensive keyboard out there; b) uses a computer for basic surfing and pictures, etc.
This is not a good keyboard for gaming or programming because the key layout of your function keys as well as for the
I had to return it because of this limitation.
Instead, I purchased the Saitek Eclipse Keyboard ( PZ30AU ), it is not wireless, but has a nice blue backlit dispay and only costs around 40 bucks. A nice tradeoff, since I can't use the cool MS keyboard.