I got my PilotMouse Optical Wireless just before Christmas and I was all excited. I got it at BestBuy and it was good deal. I really wanted a Logitech mouse, however I was looking at features and price. I wanted to spend under $30 and get wireless and optical. The more buttons the better too.

At first glance the Kensington PilotMouse didn’t attract me. That’s mainly because it had rubber all along the edges and on the buttons. Most mice are smooth plastic and this was different. However, after looking around I realized it was much less (after instant and mail in rebates) with all the features I wanted. So I examined it some more and it started to grow on me. So I got it.

It’s a nice mouse. It comes with it’s own program that installs on Mac or PC that allows you to customize the buttons and there are quite a few options. Right click, left click. both, two buttons on the side that can be used separately or together, a scroll well with a button too. I think I’m in button heaven. It’s taking me some time to get used to the side buttons but they are getting hander every day. And their programmable by application, not just system wide. Unless you want that then it can be system wide.

What are the down falls? First off batteries. No recharger. I never thought of that. The batteries that came with the mouse were dead in a week. And the next set were dead in less than two weeks. I think it has issues sleeping, or whatever it does to conserve energy. However, using rechargeable batteries is how I’m going to work around that. The second issue is it’s hard to get the movement just right. Either that or it doesn’t like me. 😉 I’ve been fiddling with scroll speed since day one and it’s getting better. It has ‘advanced’ controls for regular mouse speed, minor movement speed and major movement speed. To me that’s overkill but I’m working with it. As the days go on I tweak it a little more. It also has issues with skipping across the screen. Not sure what’s causing that. I’ve tried different mouse pads, moving the receiving base and anything else I could think of and it still does it from time to time. Oddly enough, at home it seemed to work pretty good. So maybe it’s the environment or the installed software.

All in all I give this mouse a 7/10 rating. If I could return it I probably would, however I already sent in the mail in rebate. The bright spot is that as I keep tweaking the setting it seems to be getting better. So maybe one day it’ll be perfect!!

[UPDATE 1/14/05] – I think I may have found my issue. A big shinny M&M that sat next to me on my desk may have been causing reflection interference of some kind. Since putting the M&M bowl in my drawer, the mouse has been more responsive. If this was the true issue, I’ll have to re-think my review. Check back next week for updates. I can’t fully tell if the issue is gone until I test the theory for a few days.