Wireless mice are fine. The ones that aren't stupidly designed like Apple's have the connector on the front, so when plugged in it's just like a wired mouse.

I find it's nice not to have that wire on my desktop, it would keep bumping on other stuff I like to have close.

It is possible to avoid wires for the graphic pointer, without requiring batteries or wireless connections, by replacing the mouse with a stylus and a graphic tablet (configured in the "relative" mode).

This substitution has the additional benefits that a stylus is much more comfortable, faster and more precise than a mouse.

Playing PC games with a stylus would be an interesting experience.

not very good for games though, and i think comfort might be debatable/user preference

I'm the other way around: these things actually move around on my desk, so if there's anything I want to cable-cut, it's those.

Wifi on the other hand...

I felt the same way about wireless mice for a LONG time, but technology has improved significantly.

With 2.4Ghz instead of blutooth, the reliability and latency problems are gone. Wireless mice, at the high end, have no more latency than a wired mouse. No issues with reliability in my years of owning them.

The battery also lasts a week or two, with some clever software tuning so it runs at a lower polling rate when not playing games. It charges in an hour or two.

Once you've experienced a proper wireless mouse, going back is impossible. They're so freeing. You can move in any direction and amount with NO resistance. Never fight the cable again. It's the way mice were meant to be.

Wireless keyboards are a bit more dubious. In theory they can have way better battery life due to the size, but in practice most still use crappy bluetooth so they have shit polling rates. I wish I could have it though, because it's more clutter on my desk and constantly gets in the way. I move my board around a lot to put down notepads, eat, etc.

EDIT: To be clear, my battery life is a result of using an ultralight mouse with a small internal battery, for game reasons. If you want one with AAA/AA, you'll likely get months out of it no problem.

> Once you've experienced a proper wireless mouse, going back is impossible. They're so freeing. You can move in any direction and amount with NO resistance. Never fight the cable again. It's the way mice were meant to be.

I have used a wireless mouse (I have one right now cause it's what work bought me). It is no better than a wired mouse.

I'm also very happy to never charge it or reconnect it to my computer through some GUI.

The vast majority of wireless mice and keyboards can work without using a GUI. And with your usage of "reconnect", with my Bluetooth mice I never had to use the GUI to reconnect it, they just reconnected automatically when I turned the mouse back on. I did have to pair it originally on the computer using the computer's Bluetooth settings, but that's only for Bluetooth devices and only for the initial setup. Mice and keyboards with dongles never required any kind of GUI and most of them even worked fine in low level environments like BIOSes on older machines and what not.

My $20 wireless keyboard/mouse combo has run for years off of one set of batteries, and is instantly recognized by any OS the moment you plug in the dongle.

Agree about the dongle thing, but years on a single set of batteries? That has to be an exaggeration, that or you somehow found the glorious golden mouse crafted by the gods themselves. I've never seen any device last for years on a single set of batteries, not even the lowest power of devices.

I used to use a M705 mouse from Logitech. It has a three-year rated battery life on a single pair of regular AA batteries.

https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/mice/m705-wireless-m...

This M550 mouse is rated for two years using the Bolt wireless adapter.

https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/mice/m550-signature-...

The K400 keyboard+trackpad I have routinely lasts at least couple of years despite only rated for 18 months, but it didn't get as much usage as a regular kb+m as it was mostly used as a couch keyboard or as a quick debugging combo for working on machines on a workbench.

https://www.logitech.com/en-us/products/keyboards/k400-plus-...

My parents' Casio calculator is 40 years old, and still on its original battery. It does not have solar power.

It is still used weekly or so!

I think my Logitech trackball goes for months between charges.

Afraid it's true. The mouse says it's a Logitech M185 and runs on a single AA. The keyboard is a K270 and uses 2 AAAs (I think, I taped the battery door shut since it kept falling off). I got them along with my work laptop when I started my current job five years ago, and I've only had to change them once each.

I think I may have also replaced mouse or keyboard or both a while back, with identical models, so call that two battery changes in five years, if you want to be conservative. Maybe it helps that they're disposable instead of rechargeable.

No, it is correct, nothing magical about it. The Logitech M705 works for years without battery replacement.

If you travel a lot you might have to replace the USB dongle once a year, in my experience($5).

> The battery also lasts a week or two, with some clever software tuning so it runs at a lower polling rate when not playing games. It charges in an hour or two.

Granted that I'm not the most avid gamer, the mouse I use on my gaming PC setup is a Logitech G604 Lightspeed which gets the better part of a year on a single Eneloop Pro AA battery, which I can swap out for a charged battery in seconds when it finally runs out of juice.

> The battery also lasts a week or two

That's not remotely long enough for it not to be a pain to manage. Being battery-powered is my primary objection to wireless mice and keyboards.

That said, I do have a use case where the presence of cords are a larger problem than the hassle of being battery-powered and use a wireless mouse and keyboard there. But for everything else, nothing beats a cord.

Only high poll rate wireless gaming mice have battery life that low. Most wireless mice I've used can last months on a single or dual AA batteries. The Kensington trackball I'm using right now will last nearly a year on a single pair of AA batteries, I have some rechargeable NiCads in it currently that have been going for a few months and still have a good charge left. My wife gets about a year of usage on her Microsoft Bluetooth mouse.

My Logitech MX Anywhere 2 mouse would last me a few months on a single charge before swapping to this trackball. A recharge took like an hour or so, normally I'd get the low battery notification like in the morning, plug it in when I went to go to lunch, and it would be fully charged by the time I got back and be good for a few months. Or I'd get it near the end of the day, plug it in overnight, and it would be good for a few months. Really not a hassle in the slightest.

The mouse I use can charge wirelessly from a special mouse-pad. I’ve never had to think about batteries as a result. Pricey though. Combined the mouse / charging pad were close to $300 CAD

Using a mousepad at all is a nonstarter for me, and I avoid wireless charging generally because of the power waste that comes with it (I know, I'm weird).

Cords on my mouse and keyboard (aside from the one use case I mentioned) give me exactly no trouble anyway, so wireless stuff solves no problem I generally have.

That’s fair. For a keyboard I agree: mine has Bluetooth I’ve never used before. For a mouse though the lack of a cable is nice for playing FPSes and my work setup does double duty as my gaming setup.

I used to really enjoy my Razer wireless mouse with charging dock and ability to revert to cable.

That was until I stepped away from my computer (on my desk at home) to have dinner and came back an hour later to it being dead (mouse buttons worked, just didn’t pick up movement).

I contacted support and they couldn’t offer any kind of support, I asked if they could do a firmware reset and they said not possible.

This was about 9 years ago now and last piece of Razer hardware I ever bought.

I don't know what they're talking about, my mouse takes a couple AA batteries and I can count on one hand the times I remember changing them out.

I'm using an ultralight mouse with a small internal battery, not AA's. For one with a AAA I got a few months out of it.

In practice, I find that it's really a non issue. With a traditional wired mouse, you keep it plugged in all the time. In this case, you only keep it plugged in an hour or two every week or two.

It can still be used while charging. So when charging it's not any different than a wired mouse.

Been using a wireless mouse, Logitech m325, for years, including gaming and it's connected through a USB transfer switch and still works great! I agree on keyboards, I use wired.

> The battery also lasts a week or two, with some clever software tuning so it runs at a lower polling rate when not playing games. It charges in an hour or two.

That is surprising. I could have sworn we were way above that threshold now. I remember using some wireless Logitech mice that I never powered off manually and they lasted over 6-7 months of all day usage on one or two AA-batteries.

Mine might be a bit less because I crank it to 1000 poll/s and play a lot of games.

If you don't do any gaming and are fine with 125/s, you'll get a lot longer life.

My last mouse that used one AAA lasts ~3 months on a battery.

Just today my Thinkpad Trackpoint Keyboard II arrived and you might be interested to know, it uses 2.4Ghz OR bluetooth. The feel is great, and for me it's awesome because I don't have to accommodate a second keyboard layout. I'm either using a Thinkpad laptop or this Thinkpad keyboard, both with Trackpoint and the same layout / feel.

Using a wireless mouse is a much more pleasant experience than a wired one, which is always giving a little resistance in one direction due to the wire.

As for keyboards, a lot of people move their keyboard. For example, I move mine from my standing desk when standing, to a keyboard tray when sitting, since no one can seem to manufacture a standing desk converter with proper ergonomics when sitting. The keyboard always ends up at desk level, instead of just below. Unfortunately, they don't make a wireless version of my favorite keyboard, and the wire is always getting in the way when converting.

Yeah, my work setup is centered around wired peripherals but there are times I'd really appreciate having the flexibility afforded by wireless.

I agree entirely. Especially about the need for a battery.

The mouse obviously moves relative to the desktop. And the wire can be an annoyance. Not a big deal with proper cable management, but you are not always in an ideal situation, and a wireless mouse eliminates that problem.

The wire is less of a problem for keyboards and I don't use a wireless keyboard for my desktop, but there are still some use cases.

I use a wireless keyboard/mouse (trackpad really) with my TV. In theory I could run a wire, but it'd either be absurdly long or a tripping hazard.

I agree with you on wireless keyboards, but i can never go back to using a wired mouse.

You're overstating the battery, reliability, and probably radio-clutter issues. These days, $20 gets you a wireless keyboard/mouse combo that runs flawlessly for years off a single set of batteries. All you have to do is plug in one dongle.

A mouse is constantly moving relative to the computer its being used with.

I also prefer wireless mice on a lot of things because my main work machine is a laptop. Its way more convenient to just have it connected pretty much all the time. Its bluetooth as well, so I don't even have a dongle or nub constantly plugged into the laptop its just always there.

I'd really like to get a wireless mouse for my gaming desktop, but all the wireless gaming mice are pretty pricey, have relatively short battery lives, and sometimes have other oddities. Having a lower polling interval and normal DPI is fine for basic work stuff, but when I'm playing a twitch shooter like Counterstrike its just not going to cut it.

I have a wireless keyboard because it helps reduce desk clutter, and it pairs to multiple computers. Press F1, its on my personal machine. Press F2, its on my work machine. Press F3, its on my phone. This could kind of be done with a KVM switch, but why buy additional equipment when the keyboard can do it natively?

In the end the battery lasts months on a single charge, even with the backlight on. It charges with the same cable I have already on my desk for charging any USB-C device. Charging it for a few hours every few months isn't really a hassle at all. Meanwhile its normally cord free and can easily swap between devices very quickly.

I could never go back to a wired mouse at this point. The difference in drag/weight is so noticable when I forget to charge the mouse and have to use it plugged in mid-day.