[nJm]

I know this is probably done to death, but I thought I'd ask for some opinions. I bought a Microsoft Optical Wireless mouse (white special edition one so fits in well with my iBook, although is identical to the other basic 2 button MS Wireless mice). It uses the batteries up every month or just a bit under which is a litle annoying. But what I hate most about it is that it is slow to respond, it feels really heavy in my hand, and sometimes it skips around, so when I'm moving it towards the menu bar the cursor will dart down to the dock.

I have been considering buying an Apple USB mouse. I know I'd have to put up with a cord again, but at least it fits nicely in your hand (don't need to poise fingers over the buttons), and tracks well. But it is also quite expensive,

I could get for the same money:

Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer Platinum Optical with Tilt Wheel (wired)
Microsoft Wireless Optical Mouse with Tilt Wheel
Logitech MX-500 Optical Mouse

Are there any others? I don't really care about lots of buttons (hence I'm considering the Apple mouse). All I really want it something light weight, feels good in the hand and has really quick response rates. I also like 'soft' buttons, not really loud clicky ones.

[angelmb]

Hi !, I have exactly that ms mouse, wireless optical mouse special edition, and you are right, totally, it feels heavy due to the batteries, I use rechargable batteries, they do not last 'enough', don´t? I dislike a couple of things about it, he does not move rightly over wood, I use a cartoon as mouse pad, and the feeling of the contact (tact) of the hand over the mouse is not great, too much cheap plastic. I like the mouse wheel and the mice size. Another nice ms mices are too bigh...

I also have the white USB Apple mouse, the best thing is that you feel like if it 'flies', it is really light, but once you put your hands over a mice with wheel, is hard to get used again to a non wheel mouse. So maybe another mouse with wheel would be a good option, but I would love to give a try to a mouse with extra buttons just to use Exposé with the PowerBook, it is not so confortable to use as with a desktop keyboard.

Do click and take a look

Apple USB mouse and ms ice mouse side by side

[Dale Sorel]

I say go with an MX500 and USB Overdrive

[turtle777]

As much as I hate M$, their mice rock.
I'd always prefer M$ mice over Logitech.

IntelliExplorer mice are especially awesome, because the OS X driver is so powerful, and btw, much more capable than the M$ drivers.

-t

[angelmb]

Originally posted by turtle777:
IntelliExplorer mice are especially awesome, because the OS X driver is so powerful, and btw, much more capable than the M$ drivers.

-t

hi turtle777, please could you give me/us some info about that?, I mean, are there built in drivers yet in Mac OS X for that model of mice?, or maybe just for any USB mice?

Thanks.

[jboeskool]

Originally posted by angelmb:
hi turtle777, please could you give me/us some info about that?, I mean, are there built in drivers yet in Mac OS X for that model of mice?, or maybe just for any USB mice?

Thanks.

Read this post a little further down the list http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.p...hreadid=219590

The drivers are fine with 10.3, and no, there are no generic built in drivers for just any usb mouse.

[turtle777]

Originally posted by angelmb:
hi turtle777, please could you give me/us some info about that?, I mean, are there built in drivers yet in Mac OS X for that model of mice?, or maybe just for any USB mice?

Thanks.

The built-in OS X driver supports the two main buttons (left, right) plus a basic scroll-wheel function.

The M$ driver let's you custom assign any keystrokes and other OS functions to the buttons, even different unique sets for individual applications. It's very versatile.

-t

[wuzup101]

If you are happy with a wired mouse then I would go for either the Logitech MX 510 (better sensor than the MX500 not much more expensive... comes in cool marble red or blue top). Or the MS wired mouse you mentioned. BTW, the tilt wheel, if you haven't used it yet, is truly awesome. I bought my g/f a wireless MS desktop for her new PC when she got it for xmas. It was the "leather" set. I wanted to take it for myself it was that nice!

[angelmb]

Originally posted by wuzup101:
Or the MS wired mouse you mentioned. BTW, the tilt wheel, if you haven't used it yet, is truly awesome. I bought my g/f a wireless MS desktop for her new PC when she got it for xmas. It was the "leather" set. I wanted to take it for myself it was that nice!

Really?, I mean I have a tilt emulator, it just take to press the Shift key while using the wheel mouse to get horizontal scrool. Is it really worth? how smooth?, my MS wireless optical ice mouse is not really good. Thanks.

[Randman]

M$ does have good mouses (mice or mouses?)

I have a Logitech Cordless Optical Trackman

and it rocks. Best mouse I've ever had. And my g/f, who had never used any trackball before, wanted one after a couple of times with it.

[wuzup101]

Originally posted by angelmb:
Really?, I mean I have a tilt emulator, it just take to press the Shift key while using the wheel mouse to get horizontal scrool. Is it really worth? how smooth?, my MS wireless optical ice mouse is not really good. Thanks.

I was very impressed by the performance of the mouse. I played with it on her computer for several hours just doing normal setup stuff and transfering her music and such. I didn't get to play any games with it, but it felt just as good as my MX700. Both of these mice (the MS and MX700) fit your hand very well and are very smooth. The main difference (to me anyway) is the type of wheel. The Logitech uses a more traditional wheel that has distinctive clicks as it turns. I find it very nice for gaming as I use the wheel to change weapons and the clicks make sure I choose the right one. The MS mouse has a much larger wheel that has the tilting feature. I found the tilting feature to be a really welcome addition even though I run a fairly high rez screan and don't have a ton of uses for it outside of photoshop or if someone posts a huge picture on the forums somewhere. The MS wheel is perfectly smooth (atleast in the model I got her). There are no little clicky points it just flows. I found this very interesting as I didn't think I'd like it, but it really did amaze me. The one feature I like about the logitech is the rechargeable batteries. I used to use a MS optical Explorer wireless mouse. It has since been given to my brother who also loves it. The only complaint is having to change the batts... and not knowing exactly when to. With the logitech a little light tells you when they are in need of a charge. It's also quite easy to just set it in the dock every night so you never even have to see that light.

[jboeskool]

Originally posted by wuzup101:
... but it felt just as good as my MX700... Both of these mice (the MS and MX700) fit your hand very well and are very smooth. The main difference (to me anyway) is the type of wheel... The one feature I like about the logitech is the rechargeable batteries.... It's also quite easy to just set it in the dock every night so you never even have to see that light.

I'd have to second everything that Wuzup says; Although I don't use the tilt all that much, when I do use it, (mostly on big spreadsheets, or photos, or when I have shrunk windows so as to have more than one open at a time) it's great to have. And the scroll wheel is exactly as he descibes it... smooth instead of "clicky". And like most scroll wheels, it acts as a button, and I like the fact that it takes a little extra pressure to click it. That way I'm not accidentally clicking it. Also, I find the extra buttons very functional; not in the way, but easy to activate when you want them.

I too used to have Logitech until someone stole it I liked the way it fit my hand, although not any better than my new MS mouse, and as I remember, it wasn't quite as responsive as my new one.

Although having the recharging dock meant never having to replace batteries, the life of a full charge wasn't that long, requiring you to always have the dock along ready to recharge every couple of days. If you want to be portable, this was a big pain. Having the dongle that plugged into your computer and the recharging dock needing it's own power supply was quite a bit of equipment claptrap to pack along (if using a laptop), and a lot of desktop clutter.

Though I liked my Logitech, I like the new MS with tilt even more. It's the bomb.