That’s a wireless Mighty Mouse right there. One of the most handy and yet frustrating peripherals Apple came out with. IMHO it beats the pants of any Logitech mouse¹. It’s wireless, it’s really miserly on batteries, it’ll track on pretty much any surface, it has squeeze buttons (cuteness would be if someone did an app that made a mouse squeak when you squeezed them!) and a really nifty - and very smooth - two axis scrollball.

And there, [both of] my dear readers, is the angst. See how small that thing is and how close the tolerances are? Well, you could just imagine how sensitive it is to grease and grit. Things start out okay but after a few weeks I found myself having to clean it more and more often. Oh, and cursing at it for being recalcitrant in scrolling. I’d followed Apple’s recommended cleaning procedure, which would work for a short time, but it was always a case of doing battle with it the very next day. Kei Ishii on TidBITS Talk recommended a simple, and yet very effective technique. Flip the mouse over, then rub the scrollball all kinds of directions on plain white paper. What this does is leave nice greasy tracks on the paper, but more importantly, the scrollball feels like new afterwards. Seriously, like new.

Thank you, Kei!

Unwilling to comment on relationship with paper.

1. Yes, I know, Logitech do nice kit too, but until they start producing grown-up, non-receiver-dongle-needing bluetooth rodents, I’ll pass. If you have to take up a USB port for a receiver dongle, you may as well just stick with a wired mouse. All current Macs have bluetooth built-in, use it.

Ahem. Sorry. Pet peeve.

Tags: Mighty Mouse, Apple