Hands-on with new Microsoft Wedge and Sculpt input devices (pictures)

Even in your humble tech journalist's smaller hands, the Wedge Touch Mouse felt a bit too compact. The touch surface was responsive, at least.

One useful design touch is the sliding battery cover, which you open via a button on the bottom of the mouse. Since it doesn't pop off from the device, you won't have to worry about losing it.

The bottom of the Wedge Touch Mouse reveals the battery slider and power buttons, as well as the opening for the BlueTrack sensor. The sensor is powerful enough that you can use the Wedge Touch Mouse on almost any surface. Like, say, a reed place mat.

The Sculpt Touch Mouse is not quite as visually interesting as its Wedge counterpart.

You can see here that the Sculpt Touch Mouse offers a mousing experience that's more substantial, and more traditional. The touch scroll wheel offers four-way scrolling, similar to that of Microsoft's old Arc Touch mouse.

This mouse cuts a familiar profile.

The Wedge Mobile Keyboard comes with a thick protective rubber sleeve that functions as a tablet stand when you remove it.

The rubber cover comes off easily enough. You can see the hinge in the middle of the cover here.

I've always thought Microsoft's keyboards have a less-polished, plastic quality compared with Apple's or Logitech's sleek designs. The Wedge Mobile Keyboard actually feels substantial and easy to type on, but the rounded, mashed-together key layout still reads "cheap" to me.

The Wedge Mobile Keyboard's sturdiness comes from its underside, which is made of aluminum with a triangular rubber foot.

Even if I don't love its looks, I had no objections to the feel of the Wedge Mobile Keyboard. The keys have a satisfying, responsive clickiness to them, and, most importantly, the keyboard is heavy enough that it doesn't move around while you're working.

A better look at the Wedge Mobile Keyboard's clean underbelly.

As on the Wedge Touch Mouse, the Wedge keyboard's battery enclosure has no removable parts. The tray simply slides down out of its housing.

Microsoft says it designed the Wedge Mobile Keyboard to physically match up with a tablet for convenient carrying. I suspect most people would probably put everything in a bag, but this setup would work well for moving around in an office day-to-day.

Here you can see the rubber case performing its duty as a tablet stand. You can adjust the angle of the tablet easily by tilting the support.

That's a 11.6-inch Samsung Slate 700T tablet Microsoft brought for the brief demo. It seemed sturdy enough on the rubber stand.

The full Wedge keyboard and stand experience. I can't help wishing the stand had charging capability or even a USB or AV port or two.

I assume Microsoft has reams of market research to explain why the $79 Wedge is a "Mobile" keyboard and the $49 Sculpt is a mere "Travel" peripheral.

You don't get a transforming rubber case with the Sculpt Travel Keyboard, but it at least offers a larger typing surface. It also has Microsoft's familiar Comfort Curve design, a wavy ergonomic shape that makes the keyboard more comfortable to type on for extended periods.

It wouldn't be a Microsoft hardware device without Windows-specific features. Here you can see the four new hot keys that will be a recurring theme throughout the launch of Windows 8.

Along with the new hot keys, Microsoft has also updated the Windows key to stay consistent with its new logo.