Gadgetory

hi i'm richard brent senior editor for CNET today we're gonna take a look at the Microsoft wedge mobile keyboard so this is a new $80 keyboard from Microsoft it's pretty expensive but it's also one of the best tablet keyboards that we've seen so it's got a nice clean look here you see this rubber case on top sitting around to the back you can see the metal backing so the case actually serves a couple purposes when it's on the keyword shuts off automatically take it off you can see here's the keyboard pretty straightforward design here then the case also doubles as a stand for a tablet so I've got a sample iPad here works in landscape portrait mode and what's nice about it is that the keyboard is Bluetooth so it'll work with pretty much anything that supports Bluetooth and the stand is designed so that will work with pretty much any tablet as well as any tablet with a case on so for the keyboard itself it's actually a pretty small design compared to other mobile keyboards but still it's pretty satisfying to type on it has a nice sturdy feel to it when it's on a desk keys are nice and responsive so the keyboard gets his name in part from this wedge on the bottom side and that serves a couple purposes first gives it some elevation which is useful it also houses the batteries and there's a nice design behind that pop this button out here the battery tray slides out takes two triple a's and what's a convenient design feature for travelers is that the sled doesn't actually come out of the keyboard entirely it stays right in there you can pop batteries in like no problem and it slides back in over here on the side of the wedge is the Bluetooth connection button you hold that down for three seconds or so and you'll get the connectivity light here letting you know that it's ready to pair up so with Windows eight on the way from Microsoft this is designed with that new operating system in mind you can see the new windows 8 logo button here as well as up top you've got four hot keys to Windows 8 charm buttons which take you to certain specific features like searching sharing and some others so we say this is one of the best tablet keywords we've seen because it's stand is so simple for one thing and the size of this thing makes it really pretty easy to travel with so have a couple of the key words here for comparison we have the Apple wireless keyboard that you may be familiar works with an iPad or an OS 10 device you can see here the Microsoft Board is about the same length but it's also thinner from top to bottom and here we have the Logitech tablet keyboard for iPad now this is a nice keyboard but it's a little bit bigger here also and this case is not quite as intuitive as this one and it's just sort of a little clunkier overall one other feature about this keyboard that you may appreciate you can take the rubber case put it back on here you're gonna have the wedge again if you take your tablet put the keyboard on the wedge X is sort of a convenient carrying ledge for you there and you can kind of trot around to the next meeting or wherever and carry the two devices without too much hassle so 80 bucks again this is pretty expensive but it's also really versatile and it just simply works well with any device we've tried so we're all I can recommend this without reservation so I'm rich Brown this is the Microsoft wedge mobile keyboard