This is an interesting niche product, but ultimately useful. One button on the top for on/off and only 1 speed, which is all that's necessary. It auctions through the center hole on the bottom, which is surrounded by a series of groups of short black bristles that allow the air needed for suction. You set it flat on your surface, and it sucks up your crumbs, like bits of paper, etc very quietly. It works great on a hard flat surface like a table top. It you need to vacuum on a soft surface like carpet or in a corner or crevice, just insert the included nozzle, and away it goes. To empty the little vacuum, you just twitter the top counter clockwise to open it up and empty. You will need to AA batteries to use this, just depress the tab on the side to open the battery compartment. There was a crack in the plastic right next to this tab - see my picture - but it doesn't affect the usability of the vac. At first, I thought this was a kind i'd silly product, but it's a lot smaller and quieter than a dust buster hand vac, takes up less space, can use rechargeable AA batteries, and does what i need a hand vac to do for the most part. A small brush and dustpan can mostly do what this does, but I think they seemed different purposes and each have their place. This is pretty great for keeping your desk clean if you do a lot of writing with pencils, which I do. If you work at a piano, which I do, and mark up your music a lot, you'll want this to vac up all the eraser fines.