Posted: October 26th, 2002
Written by: Justin "The Sheriff" Woods

The Cordless Presenter

The mouse/presenter modes explained:
When you're using the presenter as a mouse, the two silver buttons act like the right and left buttons on a mouse. In the middle of these two buttons, is an area that is normally reserved for a scroll wheel, though none is present. Instead, there is a button with 2 arrows. This button acts as a scroll when you are using pretty much any program. The placement is pretty much spot on, if not a little to far forward, which makes curling your index finger back to press the bottom arrow a little fatiguing after long periods of use. After a few days use, I was able to overcome this, mostly due to using the mouse so much, that I was finally used to it. Now it feels like second nature. You obviously also have control of your mouse cursor, and the laser pointer is unusable. In presentation mode, you will only be able to use the laser pointer, and move back and forward through a presentation using the right (back 1 slide), and left (forward 1 slide) buttons. The scrolling buttons don't work in presentations mode, and you will not be able to control the cursor at all.

          

At first glance, it is truly difficult to tell if the presenter is a mouse that moonlights as a presenter, or vice versa. I say this because there are only 3 indicators that this mouse can be used as a presentation tool, 2 of which are on the bottom side of the mouse, the third located on the front-left of the mouse. First, there is a switch on the bottom of the mouse that allows you to turn the mouse to one of 3 modes: On, mouse mode, and presentation mode.

          

Second, is a small trigger like button on the bottom of the mouse, which when in presenter mode is pressed to activate the laser pointer. Last, is a small window on the front-left of the presenter, which is where the laser originates. This means that flipping the small switch from mouse mode to presentation mode redirects the laser from the bottom of the mouse, where it reads movement and controls your cursor, to being controlled by the trigger, and directed out of the front of the mouse.

          

You cannot see it in the pictures, but the laser is very bright, and easily seen at over 100 feet. For fun, I opened the door to my apartment, and pointed the presenter at the apartment building across from mine, which is easily over 100 feet. Then, I pointed it about 300 feet way to another building, and to my surprise, the red dot appeared, as bright as ever. It was only at about the distance of a football field that I lost the pointer, and I had to point the presenter at a house across the street to get this result.

The 2 AA batteries are included, and according to Logitech, should power the presenter for up to 100 hours if you turn it off when not in use. At first, I was disappointed by this short battery life, but after seeing the pointer in action, I can see where the juice goes. This is a lot less than the Cordless Optical Mouseman, reviewed earlier this week as part of the Cordless Elite Duo, which has a battery life of 3 months.

Finally, this last picture shows the presenter's profile as it sits on a mouse pad. The optical sensor is mounted close to the front of the mouse. If you look at most mice, you'll notice that the ball, or in the case of an optical mouse, the sensor, is closer to the center of the mouse, almost directly under your palm. Moving the sensor forward like this puts it an inch or so closer to being right below the fingers, and I found myself unable to move the cursor, because I had moved the mouse close to the edge of my mouse pad. Of course, you don't need a mouse pad when using an optical mouse, but I like to use one, because it keeps the little skids on the bottom of the mouse clean. This isn't really a detriment to the mouse, but more of an observation. I remedied the problem by moving the mouse pad. Problem solved.

Let's look briefly at the installation.

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