Of Mice and... Mice

[stoutfellow]

Some months ago, I bought a wireless mouse. At first, the added convenience was a great pleasure. But then...

For the last month or more, its performance has been extremely erratic. On the one hand, clicks often fail to register. (:click: :click: :click-click: :click, goddamnit!: :CLICK:) On the other, there are frequent phantom clicks, making (for instance) playing FreeCell an exercise in frustration. (No, I didn't want that card put in the upper left stacks. Put it back. No! STOP THAT!)

I'm on the verge of giving up and going back to a traditional mouse. One last try, though: does anyone know of a brand of wireless mouse that isn't prone to this type of behavior? (No, it's not battery trouble. I just changed the batteries a couple of days ago, but the problem persists.) This worthless lump is a Microsoft Wireless Optical Mouse 2.0.

Comments

[svenbluelion.livejournal.com]

I had the same problem with the logitech wireless mouse i bought. The keyboard still works fine but the mouse kept loosing its connection, Id constantly have to hit the sync button to make it work. Finally just gave up and went back to a wired mouse.

If you still wanna stay wireless you might check out cnet.com and browse through their reviews. Might at least give you a place to start.

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

That's probably a good idea, thanks. (I may not act on it, depending on how fed up I'm feeling this weekend, but it's still a good idea.)

[countrycousin.livejournal.com]

RFI? I notice that I'm getting a lot of TVI these days when my furnace blower kicks in, even though the signal feed is cable.

I used a Msoft wireless for a few years - it is still installed, but I don't run that computer often. Don't recall problems. But you might have a lemon.

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

I suppose RFI is a possibility. If so, that's a strong push in favor of going back to a traditional mouse. (By way of comparison, though, I don't have much trouble with the wands for the various parts of my TV/VCR/stereo system.)

[countrycousin.livejournal.com]

Aren't those IR?

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

Eh, probably. I'm several flavors of geek, but "techno-" isn't one of them.

[countrycousin.livejournal.com]

I hope this post means you have power back!

[stoutfellow.livejournal.com]

Nope, that was posted just before the storm hit. (As of 4:00 this afternoon, I still didn't have power. Again, I'm posting from the office. Word is that almost everyone will have power restored by tomorrow evening.)

WOnkY peRformancE

[p-o-u-n-c-e-r.livejournal.com]

I have both the keyboard and mouse as Wireless tools.

Please forgive me belaboring the obvious. But when you "changed" the batteries, did you open a new package?

In my cheap RealDigital (tm) equipment, a new battery provides good performance. A month or so old but still "good" battery -- according to the little tester on the side of the more expensive packages -- is not good enough. The whole system is apparently highly voltage sensitive.

The alternative I've tried and that does work is switching over to a USB keyboard and mouse that in turn plug into a, powered, 4-slot USB expander that in turn is at the end of a 6 foot cable plugging into the PC. That gives me not only a longer run between the PC and the keyboard tray but some more convenient USB access. However, the USB mouse doesn't have a scroll wheel while the cordless mouse does and so I've switched back.

[tygerr.livejournal.com]

I have gotten that exact same set of symptoms from three different (wired!) trackpads, of two different makes, on two different computers.

I begin to think the problem may be in software, not hardware.

[toraks.livejournal.com]

Don't know if you're still worried about it or gave up on it, but I've got a wireless mouse at work and love it. It has problems when someone else has one and is using it at the same time -- so annoying when another grad student got one back in my old lab, but other than that, since I've been here, it's worked fine. I wondered if someone else has one around here because it got finicky once, but hasn't happened again. Apparently they're really bad on getting interfered with.

I can let you know what kind it is when I'm back at work -- if you're still interested, reply to this and I'll look at it for you.

Oh, and the receiver needs to be far away from anything else electrical, have definitely found that makes a difference. Interference again, I guess. I've got the receiver high up on a shelf above the desk level and that seems to work.