Well,
Like the rest , I was "willfully" deceived to assume that Microsoft Arc Touch Surface Edition would work with any laptop and OS. Even though i read thru the specifications page, where I read this mouse should work with any laptop having Bluetooth 4.0 LE hardware and support software stack.
So i have Fujitsu S710 with built in bluetooth , i was not able to find its specs even in the product data sheet, so I assume it is Bluetooth 2.0/3.0 .
To overcome the limitation, i bougth an IOGEAR GBU521 bluetooth dongle with bluetooth 4.0 hardware spec.
Then I was perplexed how to plugin the dongle in the laptop already having internal bluetooth enabled, since I was not able to find a utility to selectively disable the internal bluetooth (usually builtin on the WiFI card). So did it via the Windows Device Manager , device disabling option. Avoiding so would presumably result in a confusing bluetooth setup with two (internal and USB dongle) devices active and only having standard Windows 7 (32bit) interface to search for bluetooth devices, and not knowing actually which of the two is working.
Installed IOGEAR GBU521 software supplied on CD. It did not have any effect and did not show the WIDCOMM bluetooth stack drivers icon in my task bar, still the stock windows bluetooth icon displays.
But upon search the via the stock windows 7 menu, i was able to find the Microsoft Arc Mouse SE, which i promptly added glowing with temporary joy...since even after being added there is one mysterious "Bluetooth Peripheral Device" which does not gets installed and the mouse does not work.
Reading this thread I come up with the following queries:
- It can work with Windows 7 , provided the machine has bluetooth 4.0 hardware (either builtin or USB addon) . Which software stack is supposed to work with it. WIDCOMM or stock Windows 7.
- It cannot work with Windows 7 at all, even if the Bluetooth 4.0 hardware/software is present.
- It will work by replacing Windows 7 with Windows 8+ on the same machine having Bluetooth 4.0 hardware/software .
- Does it work with non surface laptops with Windows 8+. I have an Asus TX 300 Transformer book with Windows 8, have not tried it yet, but is it supposed to work with it.
Thanks for your replies.