“I purchased the Mighty Mouse, eventually, with skepticism, chiefly from reading an equal share of both positive and negative reviews. I remember taking a trek down to the Apple Store in Regent Street, London, with a couple of friends—who had iPod issues they were looking to sort– to buy this little rodent of a computer device. I got home that day, plugged it in, installed the drivers and I was away,” Aaron Wright writes for Apple Matters.
“My first reaction? Wow, excellent! I couldn’t understand why so many people were knocking this mouse, it was sort of a revolution as far as Apple products go, we finally had a two buttoned mouse,” Wright writes.
“However, that joy wasn’t going to last. I believe I purchased my Mighty Mouse around September 2005 and used it pretty much daily until about two weeks ago, when I finally decided enough was enough. I wasn’t fed up with any of the software functions of the mouse, nor was I disappointed with anything else the mouse had to offer, as such,” Wright writes. “I was actually fed up of using the little white piece of plastic because the scroll wheel [Scroll Ball] had completely clogged up. It had ceased to function and I was angry and frustrated that I could no longer take full benefit of the £40 I paid for it. I’m now planning to return it to the Apple store this weekend to see if I can get a replacement, but then I got to thinking, is there any point?”
“I look after my computer equipment quite well, especially considering the amount of money spent on it, I think it’s only right. But no amount of cleaning could prevent the [Scroll Ball] getting clogged up,” Wright writes. “Here’s something I now fear. Every new iMac sold since January, I believe, comes equipped with a Mighty Mouse as standard, no more singled-buttoned ‘Mouse.’ I’ve had my Mighty Mouse less than a year and it’s already gone [bad] on me, so what’s in store for all those iMac buyers out there? It’s a worrying thought for Apple if other users out there experience the same issues I’ve had with mine.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Apple’s Mighty Mouse is a great mouse when it’s clean. It’s the only mouse we’ve found that we actually use the scrolling feature routinely… when it’s clean. We’ve had multiple Mighty Mouse units in action since last August. On average, they have each been cracked open and the Scroll Ball’s tiny magnetic rollers cleaned approximately six (6) times in the past 11.5 months. That’s way too much, Apple. We don’t know how to fix the clogged Scroll Ball issue, but Apple should really work on this problem. Our hands are generally quite clean; we do wash frequently. We can only imagine how quickly a Mighty Mouse in a classroom setting would clog. This whole thing reminds us of one thing: time to go crack open another Mighty Mouse and clean the ball’s tiny magnetic rollers once again. Sigh.
[Update: 1:04pm EDT: We’re back. Cleaning accomplished. Again. Aren’t we fast? We’ve had a lot of practice. A clean Mighty Mouse is a joy! Anyway, for those in need, Apple has an impotent, impractical “How to clean your Mighty Mouse” doc and video on their site, but real instructions on how to clean your Mighty Mouse can be found here.]
Related MacDailyNews articles:
ZDNet UK review gives Apple Mighty Mouse 6.6 out of 10 – August 31, 2005
Dr. Mac: ‘Mighty Mouse is the finest mouse Apple has ever produced’ – August 09, 2005
The Boston Globe: first shipments of Apple’s Mighty Mouse ‘sold out almost immediately’ – August 08, 2005
Mercury News: Apple’s Mighty Mouse looks ‘like the world’s most carefully crafted bar of soap’ – August 08, 2005
AnandTech: Apple’s Mighty Mouse ‘isn’t exactly perfect’ – August 05, 2005
NY Times’ Pogue: ‘I certainly prefer the Mighty Mouse’ to Apple’s standard one-button mouse – August 04, 2005
Apple’s Mighty Mouse dissected (with image) – August 04, 2005
The Motley Fool: ‘Mighty Mouse may be the next step in Apple’s quiet crusade to lure Windows users’ – August 04, 2005
Mossberg pans Apple Mighty Mouse, says Microsoft’s latest mouse is better – August 04, 2005
Review: Apple’s Mighty Mouse – Third-party USB mouse makers should be very afraid – August 03, 2005
Apple introduces multi-button ‘Mighty Mouse’ with ‘Scroll Ball’ for Mac and Windows – August 02, 2005
Apple’s new ‘Mighty Mouse’ provides audio feedback for clicking and scrolling – August 02, 2005
Apple’s mythical two-button mouse – March 19, 2005
RUMOR: Apple may soon debut two-button mouse – March 15, 2005
Apple’s Pro Mouse is truly a joy to use… for about five minutes – May 29, 2004
The time has come for Apple to ship a two-button scroll mouse standard – June 09, 2003
Should Apple reconsider the one-button mouse? – October 23, 2002
I finally switched when the iMac Core Duo came out and got a 20″ along with Apple Care. Being a Windows EX, I was no stranger to cleaning mice balls, but finally gave up and Apple sent me a new Mighty Mouse. It has hung up only once, and cleaned easily. My problem may not even be related to the mouse, but the cursor will jump halfway across the screen once or twice and hour. Did this with both mice. Annoying sometimes. Any ideas?
TowerTone:
Try a new mouse pad or a sheet of paper.
I’ve never had this problem. Wash you hands, nerds!
I do, but they sweat when I read stupid post.
Thanks Luke
Brings back (not-so) fond memories of my Kensington TurboMouse. I absolutely loved the thing EXCEPT that the rollers under the ball would constantly gunk up and need to be cleaned. The fact that the Mighty Mouse does the same doesn’t surprise me but this type of problem does NOT affect only Macintosh products.I get tired of reading about problems with Mac products that ALSO affect every other like Windoze products the same.
“This is a maintenance issue, not a design flaw.
—> Have to respectfully disagree here. Cleaning mouse balls became an extinct practice after the death of the optomechanical mouse. Yes, I know this is a top scroll ball and not an underside ball, but IMHO the Mighty Mouse sucketh *mightily*. To each his own I guess. Apple can build a better scroll system than this that does not need cleaning (read: wheel instead of ball).
Check this out – here is a picture of the *first* mouse invented in 1963(!) by Douglas Engelbart:
Mine? It likes to “click” on it’s own sometimes. Goes crazy if my fingers even get fairly close to the top of it. Then it goes away.
And then it comes back.
It seems to be timed to humidity. And this is the third Mighty Mouse I have had that has this issue. As well as the cloging.
I like the mouse but it’s got issues that need a little ironing out.
[I got one of the new iMac Core Duo’s when they first came out, which came with a Mighty Mouse. After about 4 months, the scroll ball stopped scrolling down, but would scroll in any other direction.]
Exact same problem, and admit Hoolihan’s (above) advice works.
Only, I just think of the scroller as ‘the little man in the boat’ whenever I need to get her to respond happily.
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Oh, and I forgot the speaker inside of the MM makes a faint ‘ticking’ whenever my neighbor uses his Ham radio.
i have a mighty mouse, and i love it. occasionaly it does stop scrolling down, but it doesnt bother me. i just turn it upside down, give the ball a little scroll, and its good as gold!
the mighty is the best mouse i have ever used, and when i use other macs without a mighty mouse, i find myself trying to scroll and right click on it.
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” /> but yea, i couldn’t operate without one.
5/5 in my books.
you find with everything, your going to have to clean it every now and then. so stop complaining.
I thought this was a huge problem, too, when my own scroll ball stopped working after a month or so.
Then I read the trick of turning it upside down and rolling it around over a cotton cloth while pressing down (so that the scroll pea is depressed while it’s rolling). Works like a charm.
Every month or so, when it starts to have trouble, I’ll just turn it over and roll it around on my pant leg or T-shirt. It takes about four seconds and it works every time.
I just cleaned my MM for the first time since I had it (bought it when it came out). I opened it up, so it is now spotless on the inside. Unfortunately opening it means breaking the glue spots where the collar is glued to the top. You can either glue the collar back on or you can use a few small strips of adhesive tape to hold it in place.
As to the invention of the mouse: that was 1968, not 1963. Doug gave a brilliant demonstration of personal computing at the ACM conference, using a mouse, hypertexts, windows, multimedia and even collaborative work through the network with the remote person moving a second pointer on the screen. See
http://devwin.acm.org/awards/citation.cfm?id=7929781&srt=all&aw=140&ao=AMTURING
(or Google forthe words:
acm mouse demo engelbart
and use the first link)
You can find a link to videos of the demo on that page.
I saw them at the 30th anniversary of the demo in 1998.
What most people do not know is that Doug still uses the “other” device: a chord keyboard. When he uses the keyboard he uses two hands on the keys, but when he grabs the mouse with his right hand, he also moves his left hand to the chord keyboard sitting to the left of the keyboard. He can continue “typing” there using chord presses.