VidaBox Premium Wireless Keyboard Review

Over the past few weeks I’ve been evaluating VidaBox’s new Premium Wireless Keyboard.  The keyboard arrived nicely packaged, and comes with a nice soft case for storing it away while not in use.

The keyboard features all the media keys along the top that you’d expect to find on a HTPC Keyboard, along with a trackball.  I have to admit when I first saw the trackball I was a little put off by it, I’ve never been good at using them.  I was pleasantly surprised by how easy I picked up using it and how accurate. I would still personally prefer a track pad, but given the small nature of the keyboard I can see why the trackball was chosen.

Installation couldn’t be easier, I simply plugged in the included small dongle into my test Windows 7 HTPC and I was ready to go.  There’s no software that has to be loaded, or any that even comes with the device for that matter, which is another plus for this device.

The range on the keyboard is also great, I used it up to ~40 feet away from my HTPC and never had any issues with losing key strokes or accuracy with the trackball.

To keep the size of the keyboard down there’s isn’t a dedicated number pad, so turning num lock on (which is a bios and Windows default) takes over some of the letters on the keyboard to use as a number pad.  This threw me for a few after I rebooted as I couldn’t logon to my machine.  After realizing that num lock was on and I was able to logon and turn num lock off Windows remembered my preference. If needed you can also turn most bio’s boot options to not enable num lock.

If you’re looking for a small wireless keyboard with great range add this one to your list to check out and I guarantee it’ll end up being  at the top of your list.  After having the chance to evaluate it I would have no reservations in purchasing one.