The Traveler 6000, a new no-frills mobile mouse made by Chinese company Genius, is about as basic and uncomplicated as you can get. For frequent travelers, that's a good thing–all you need is a mouse that will move the cursor and take up minimal space. Of course, cost is an issue as well; you don't want something that you'll be afraid to toss into your back where it might get banged up. The Traveler 6000 pulls through on all these fronts.
Available in blue, red, black, and a flowery "Classic" design, the Traveler 6000 is a basic, ambidextrous three-button mouse with a solid, reassuring feel to the left and right mouse buttons and a nicely-tactile scroll wheel. Although Genius hasn't gone to great lengths to contour its mouse for the sake of ergonomics, it's still satisfactorily comfortable to hold and use. In use, the Traveler 6000 is extremly smooth, most likely owing to the 1200 dpi tracking resolution. In my several days of constant use, I noticed no lag or break in connection. The USB "pico-receiver," as Genius call it, bears a striking resemblance to Logitech's own Nano receiver, but it protrudes a couple millimeters farther when plugged in. Nevertheless, I found it was no problem to leave the receiver plugged into my laptop at all times, adding a bit of extra convenience. Should you decide to remove it, however, it integrates cleverly with the mouse's chassis in two possible ways: it can attach to the underside of the mouse at the very front, or you can push a button on the back of the mouse which releases the spring-loaded top panel. Removing this panel, which consists of the two mouse buttons and the bit of palmrest directly behind them, gives you access to a receiver storage slot and the AAA battery. Whichever way you choose to store it, the receiver is held very securely. Installation is essentially nonexitent; there is no driver CD or bundled software that needs to be installed. Just plug the USB receiver, turn the mouse on, and click away.
So, would I recommend one over, say, a Logitech V220? It's hard to say. In this market segment, you're not going to concentrate particularly hard on aspects such as programmable buttons (neither mouse has any), pinpoint headshot accuracy, or adjustable DPI. Genius isn't a particularly well-known manufacturer, so I can't personally vouch for their products' longevity. But for reasonable expectations for day-to-day mobile use, the Genius Traveler 6000 is a perfectly reasonable option at a very reasonable price. And sometimes, that's all you need.
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