July 27th, 2006
Teaching an old mouse new tricks
Tuesday’s announcement of Apple’s US$69 Wireless Mighty Mouse elicited a lot of excitement from the Mac faithful, but I am more of the opinion that it’s about time.
One of the very first criticisms of the original Mighty Mouse when it debuted almost one year ago was the lack of a wireless option. The original Mighty Mouse was a revolutionary step out of the dark ages for Apple as their first mouse that featured more than one button. Like most things from Apple, they took it to a new level by adding four independently programmable buttons "without compromising simplicity for users who prefer just a single-button mouse."
While I like the scroll ball idea in the original Mighty Mouse, it can be a bear to clean. The invisible button concept is a little hard to get used to as well. I find myself always clicking on the scroll ball and opening up the annoying Dashboard application. After I turned that off I found the right button implementation to be hokey, it’s hard to tell if I’m clicking in the right place some times.
Nick Starr has posted some pictures of the new and old Mighty Mice for comparison. In his hands-on experience he notes that the Wireless Mighty Mouse can be used with one or two AA batteries and that it works on 2-inch thick glass (a feat for optical mice).
One of the most interesting features that has come to light about the Wireless Mighty Mouse is that it’s a true laser mouse as opposed to the previous Mighty Mouse which is only optical. Apple claims that the new mouse is "20 times more sensitive than standard optical mice." Starr also notes that there is "no visible laser" in the new model.
While it’s great that Apple finally released a Bluetooth version of their mouse, it’s about a year too late. Combined with the weird button configuration ("squeeze the two side buttons?") I am going to pass and stick with third-party Bluetooth mice. My current fave is the BT510 from Radtech.
What mouse do you prefer?
Jason D. O'Grady is the editor of PowerPage.org, which has been publishing daily mobile technology news since December 1995. For disclosures on Jason's industry affiliations, click here or to view Jason's full profile click here.
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| 07/27/06
