You've probably made your mind up already haven't you? Just look at it. It's a mouse that's shaped like BOSS's most famous pedal of all time. You want one.
And indeed that was what we said when we saw the Compact Mouse. Somehow, other mice just seem boring by comparison, and the good folks at Roland were happy to sate our desires.
It arrived in a box just like that of a real compact BOSS pedal and on opening it up we found that wasn't all it had in common with it's noisemaking sibling…
Size- and layout-wise, it's almost identical to a DS-1. There's the usual three knobs up top and a glowing red LED when it's plugged-in (Mick was most upset there wasn't a blue LED option for Keeley mod fans) - there's even two screws on the side for the 'battery compartment'.
The main differences? Well, mercifully it's a bit thinner than a proper DS-1, though only by a centimetre or so, but its footprint is identical, and there are no input and output jacks (there's a mouse-wheel where the output should be).
So, what's it like to use? Well, sadly you can sum it up in one word: painful.
To get a sense of how user-friendly the Compact Mouse is, just pick up your DS-1 and see how comfortable it feels when you hold it like a mouse. Not exactly ergonomic is it?
The clickable knob/buttons are a bit odd too - they feel slightly unsteady, more like joysticks than buttons. However the side-mounted mouse-wheel is actually really well positioned.
So, if you're a hardcore gamer, a graphic designer or a full-time producer, this might be a novelty item too far for you - the DS-1 wasn't made for comfort, after all.
But if you've got a computer-based home studio and you want to add that touch of ultimate desktop awesomeness, you can't go wrong here.
The Compact Mouse costs £29.99 and is available from the BOSS website, it's a limited edition though, so get in there while you can!
