Microsoft Arc Mouse - Black

Heads up: I just received the mouse, and these are my initial thoughts. More to come. I have purchased several Microsoft Arc mice (2 - Touch / 1 - Surface Touch) over the years. My original Touch mouse I wore through the bottom of the mouse to the PCB. So, it's fair to say I use the mouse as my daily driver. The new Arc mouse is spectacular! With Windows 10, I had the mouse paired within a few seconds. The biggest challenge really is getting used to the buttons, which isn't difficult for me. I don't rest my fingers on the mouse, and typically my hand isn't on the mouse most of the time. So, differentiating between a right and left click is simple. What I love about the this mouse is the removal of the scroll button. The loss of haptic feed back is unfortunate, but the problem with the scroll button was material could easily get between the buttons, essentially disabling the scroll button. With my old Surface Touch Arc mouse, my daily routine was when pulling it out to slide my finger nail allow the edge of the button, so the scroll button worked properly. With the new Microsoft Arc mouse, there's no scroll button. The entire surface can be used for up/down scrolling, as well (apparently) side scrolling. The other really amazing feature is the mouse has lost weight. I don't know how they did it, but not only is the mouse thinner, but it's lighter than the previous Arc mouse designs. For those uninitiated, what is so compelling about the Arc mice is the fact that the mouse folds flat for storage and to turn off. So for travel, the mouse can fit in a pocket, or easily slide into a case without taking up much room. You don't have to wonder if you've turned it on or off, because if it's flat, it's off and when it's arced it's on. Where this version of the Arc mouse improves upon the former iterations is the removal of the scroll button. Instead, the top front surface of the mouse is your left and right mouse button, and up/down as well as side-to-side scroll wheels. Based on my initial usage, I strongly recommend this mouse. It's a simple looking mouse, that works extraordinarily well. The biggest challenge most users will face is getting used to the button(s), but it isn't as much of a challenge as some reviews had made it out to be. I'll update this review later with more long-term usage. Overall, I'm extremely impressed with the mouse. First day: I've done a lot of different tasks with the device today. From gaming to productivity work (lots of copying/pasting), and overall I didn't have many real issues. However, I did run into one thing. Scroll sensitivity - The button didn't immediately sense when I was scrolling up or now. It did sense it, but there was a delay. 3-Days later: Just downloaded the Microsoft Keyboard and Mouse Center software for Windows 10. I adjusted the DPI and the scroll sensitivity and my concerns are resolved. Scroll sensitivity is instant now. With the DPI adjusted to 1200 from 1000, screen travel feels 1:1 and instantaneous without lost or erratic movements. This will probably impact my battery life, but at this point, this is an amazing mouse! One Month: Overall I am happy with the purchase. I have an issue with one program where I need to disable scrolling, and that's done in the MS software. 3-Year Review: I've downgraded my review. The problem isn't the mouse, it's Microsoft's Bluetooth implementation. While there were issues with it in previous versions of Windows 10, the problem is they have since made it difficult to work-around the issue. With my hardware there is no work-around. The problem is that Windows automatically places the USB hub into sleep mode after an incredibly short period of time. With earlier versions of Windows 10 you were able to disable this, but current versions don't permit it. The result is that after an incredibly short window, the USB hub as well as the internal BlueTooth hardware goes to sleep. The problem is that the hardware doesn't efficiently wake from this state and in some cases crashes. I've worked the issue with MS, and it had gotten to a point where it was working well, but then since they've made some significant changes to their Bluetooth implementation it's become unusable. I've reverted to using an older Arc mouse that uses its own dongle. It still occasionally runs into problems with the hardware not spinning up, but the mouse doesn't stop functioning as frequently. What's really frustrating is this doesn't happen as with other Bluetooth hardware like it does with the Arc Mouse.