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Article Title: Logitech MX Revolution 2.4Ghz Wireless Laser Mouse Review

Article Author: Daryl Quenet
Article Category: Hardware Related
Times Read: 7803
Date: 2007-04-15 11:49:51
Pages: 1

Introduction

Every so often a product comes out that revolutionizes the experience of interfacing with the computer. In the last few years there haven’t been many innovations in the mouse; they’ve become more precise, and the wireless technology has improved yielding latencies that of a wired USB mouse, but nothing life shattering. Now enter the Logitech MX Revolution, the “World’s Most Advanced Mouse”.

Logitech MX Revolution Wireless Laser Mouse - Front View

Logitech MX Revolution Wireless Laser Mouse - Body View

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With a slogan like “World’s Most Advanced Mouse” Logitech is setting the bar high for how it thinks we the consumers will receive its product. After just 4 hours of use this mouse has lived up to all expectations, and done so with style.

Look and Feel

In the area of ergonomics this mouse feels like it was made for my hand, with its indented rubber thumb rest and massive size (relative to the normal mouse). The overall size of the mouse may be an issue to some, to me it was well worth for the number of features they jammed in this mouse. Despite the size the Logitech MX Revolution glides over my desk on its four low-friction polytetrafluoroethylene (aka Teflon same stuff used in body armor) feet smoother then any previous Logitech mouse including the Logitech G7 Laser.

Features

Although some of the features in this mouse such as the 800 DPI Laser Sensor are not state of the art technology (My Logitech G7 Laser Wireless gaming mouse has a 2000 DPI Laser Senor), the new features quickly more than make up for the 800DPI sensor. And being powered by 2.4ghz wireless technology, the mouse is more responsive while maintaining the same low latency I’ve come to expect from my G7 Laser Mouse. So to compensate for the lower DPI you will find the faster you move your mouse, the faster the cursor will move. In 3 inches I can cross 2600 pixels (dual monitors) with a flick of my wrist, or around 300 pixels in 3 inches when moving the mouse super slow, this makes tools like the Lasso in Photoshop way more easy and prescise to use.

The Logitech Setpoint software allows you to configure or program 6 different buttons & functions, overall there are 9 different buttons / scrollers. These are referred to as Left Click, Right Click, Manual Shift (Advanced scroll wheel), One Touch Search, Forward Back, Left Scroll, Right Scroll, and Document Flip (New Feature).

Logitech MX Revolution Wireless Laser Mouse - Setpoint Button Mapping

Now this may sound like more buttons then one person should need, but as a web developer and super heavy duty user I constantly found myself reconfiguring the buttons on my G7 Laser based on what kind of tasking I was doing. Some template data entry I do involves copying and pasting content that is in the wrong case (Upper Case instead of Title Case), so I set one of my buttons to the key combo Shift F3 which changes the case of all selected text (this office function alternates better UPPERCASE lowercase and Title Case so to change from UPPER to Title its 2 clicks).

Now up until this point things have been pretty standard feature wise its time to introduce some of my favorite new features which make this mouse revolutionary. The first is the Hyper fast scrolling powered by Smartshift ™ technology, which is complete redesign of the scroll wheel. Instead of traditional click scroll wheel this new one is variable, the faster you spin the wheel the less friction that imposes it. If you spin it fast enough it will free spin for up to 7 seconds, this makes transversing a long document painless.

The next neat new feature is called Document Flip, this feature has implemented a brand new thumb scroller which acts as 3 buttons. The first button is the ability to press the scroller in like a standard button which brings up a list of all programs that are open similar to hitting Alt Tab, except you list a list of all programs running. Now to navigate you can scroll up or down one program at a time. When you have selected your desired program push the scroller in again and you’ll be switched over to that program. This is particularly handy doing web development / content migration or any other circumstance which requires a lot of multitasking.

Another feature they tried to introduce which in my eyes ended up being a flop (but gave me an extra button) is One Touch Search. Personally I always have a copy of Firefox open so searching is no issue, I quickly reprogrammed this button for Show Desktop (now that’s useful!).

Software

Now over to the software end of things the Logitech MX Revolution requires Logitech Setpoint to be installed to use the advanced features on the mouse. And my only real issues with this mouse stem from the software. My main issue is that I can’t reprogram the Back or Forward buttons to a double click button, you can set it to almost any other button combination except this which seems to be a software bug. This personally drives me crazy with all my past Logitech mice since 2001 I have programmed the side button to be double click (Mouseman iFeel, Mouseman Dual Optical, and G7 Laser).

Conclusion

In conclusion this mouse is by far the most advanced and comfortable / ergonomic mouse I have used, and definitely the “World’s Most Advanced Mouse”. The only drawbacks people may find are in the software, and possibly the size of this mouse especially when sitting on the charging base. The only thing I could think of to make this mouse better would be stealing an idea from the Logitech G7 Laser which was the idea of battery cartridges. Instead of having a built in battery the G7 Laser has ejectable batteries, which it comes with two of, so when battery dies, you simply grab the spare battery from the charger, and throw the empty one into the charger. But the battery life is excellent so I could see myself using this mouse for years.