Oh please... not now!

[Nick]

I did have a nice big blog post all written up which had a solution for the Middle East, a working formula for free, clean electricity and a perfectly viable, cost effective solution for dealing with the credit crunch on a low income which would also enable you to get a foot on the housing ladder.

But thanks to Logitech, the world will now never know.

I'm using a Logitech MX500 desktop set-up, which consists of a keyboard and MX500 mouse connected to the PC via Bluetooth.

This all sounds well and good until, as frequently happens, either the mouse or the keyboard drop the connection.

With the mouse it's not too much of an issue, there's the 'budunk' sound from Vista to let me know that I've disconnected a device, even though I haven't actually disconnected anything... but wiggles the mouse a bit, click it a few times and it reconnects.

I wish the keyboard was as simple.

When the keyboard disconnects I might be lucky and it'll just stop typing... but more often than not I'll be mid-keypress when it decides to take a break, resulting in the PC thinking the key is still being pressed.

This isn't so much of a problem usually as you get something that looks like thisssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss.

But it can cause a minor loose sphincter moment if you're in the middle of ordering something online when you suddenly go from ordering 1 to ordering 11111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111.

But worse is when you're in the act of hitting the delete or backspace keys, as rather than correcting an error, you sit there helpless as your words disappear from the screen... Now I've learnt to deal with this by just clicking outside the window I'm working on and of course there's the 'undo' function in Word.

But you have a real issue when the keyboard goes on a Bluetooth holiday and the mouse, obviously jealous of all the breaks the keyboard takes, decides to go too... as has just happened to me for the umpteenth time this week.

No mouse to click outside the window and a PC that thinks I've got my finger welded down on the backspace key... It's like a Cillit Bang advert... BANG! And the text is gone!

Despite having the latest software, firmware and all the updates, it seems that Logitech have built a bit of an edge into their kit, to keep you on your toes I guess. I used to have word set to save every minute because of the instability of Vista... now I have it set to save every minute because I use a Logitech Bluetooth mouse and keyboard...

So as petrol prices increase and world peace gradually falls apart, think of what could've been if Logitech had just sorted out their bloody drivers or even responded to my angry mail asking for some bloody help.

[pauldarkside]

I had (still have but it's been relegated to the cupboard) the same setup and right up until the last firmware upgrade (included in the driver upgrage) it was pretty reliable. As soon as that was applied, right in the middle of a big coding job, it was almost useless - repeating characters, etc.

I ended up ordering the MS Laser 7000 desktop package (wireless instead of Bluetooth) and haven't looked back; the mouse is so much lighter (really surprised me how heavy the Logitech one was) and more responsive and the keyboard is much nicer to type with. Best of all it's been 100% reliable - I think it uses the same MS proprietary wireless technology as the Xbox 360.

[kalniel]

Why aren't you using wired input devices for mission critical work?

[pauldarkside]

Why aren't you using wired input devices for mission critical work?

I have masochistic tendancies and my motherboard doesn't support direct synaptic transmissions