Microsoft Wireless Optical Mouse

The $45 Microsoft Wireless Optical Mouse fits either hand, and it offers right- and left-click options, a textured scroll wheel, accelerated scrolling, and some customization options. This stylish mouse sports a distinct arch as well as a perch for your thumb and another for your pinky, and it's bulkier than some of the other mice we tested. You also have a choice of four colors--light blue, dark blue, steel blue, and red--if you care about such matters.

The right- and left-click buttons are longer than normal and comfortable to use, and scrolling around documents using the middle wheel was easy in our tests. The mouse's overall sensitivity was impressive, and the cursor's movement was very smooth; we didn't need to change the default settings for speed. The scroll wheel permits you to move side to side as well as up and down. However, the accelerated scrolling feature, which lets you speed up your pace within documents, tended to be jerky, and one tester had to turn off this default setting to eliminate the erratic behavior.