“Apple boasts that the Magic Mouse is the ‘world’s first Multi-Touch mouse,’ and we’ll take the company at its word on that. But what’s multitouch like when integrated into a mouse? It’s pretty sweet—most of the time. Scrolling on the Magic Mouse is incredibly smooth, and since there are no mechanical parts, you don’t have to worry about junk getting into a scroll wheel (or scroll ball). Horizontal control is also more precise than with the Apple Mouse. I keep the ‘scroll with momentum’ option turned on, as it’s very useful when navigating large pages,” Eric Bangeman reports for Ars Technica.
“The two-finger swipe is quite useful when browsing the Web, and I’ve already stopped right-clicking to go backwards and forwards through my browser history. You don’t even need to grip the mouse as you swipe; there’s enough static friction to keep it from moving if you perform a hands-off gesture (I’ve tried on glass, wood, and granite),” Bangeman reports.
MacDailyNews Take: We do not totally agree with Bangeman’s assessment of the two-finger swipe. Unless you use a very light touch, two finger swiping can cause the very light Magic Mouse to slide and therefore can be more of a pain than it’s worth. That said, all other aspects of what just might be the world’s most beautiful looking computer mouse are excellent; the scrolling (vertical and horizontal), the accuracy, and the smoothness of cursor movement. With a few days of use behind us now, we can already recommend Apple’s Magic Mouse highly (our Mighty Mouses have been retired), but unless you can train yourself to two-finger swipe with a very light touch (the mouse is definitely sensitive enough to read lightly applied gestures) just don’t expect to use the two-finger swipe as the mouse can be simply too light and slide too smoothly on surfaces for it to be useful.
Bangeman continues, “If you have used screen zoom with the Apple Mouse, you’ll find the implementation with the Apple Mouse to be fairly intuitive—simply hold down the control key and swipe your finger across the top of the mouse… If you’re in love with multitouch and are tired of futzing with scroll wheels and scroll ball hand crud build-up, the Magic Mouse may be for you.”
Full review here.
I used X on Unix workstations long before I switched to Macs in 2003 (and VAX workstations before that, lest you doubt my old-fogeyness). Never gave much thought to Macs until OS X, and when I finally got one I quickly consigned the single-button mouse to the nearest junk drawer.
The mouse functions beautifully, got mine a couple of days ago. The only thing I don’t understand is the rails on the bottom. What I haven’t heard mentioned in the incredible amount of noise it makes when moving the mouse.
On my wood desk its not too bad, but at my office, which has some sort of hard surface, it sounds like I’m sanding. Once everyone there gets one, which will be shortly, the room will be filled with the sounds of mouse sanding.
@drMSSDB
What one earth are you talking about. This thing it like a white rock. It has an incredibly solid feel and heft. Its actually kind of heavy.
Personally, I think the low profile is ideal ergonomically, and I have large hands. (Arnold Schwartzenegger sized according to the wall at the Planet Hollywood casino in Vegas.
The design allow the mouse to fit into your hand without any cocking of the wrist. Basically my palm, pinky and thumb are all resting on the table
Someone be intellectually honest on this board for once. The small, light, flimsy keyboard looks cheap and is ridiculously out of proportion when placed in front of the 27 inch iMac. I realize you can get the keypad version that’s longer but compare this keyboard with the more solidly built keyboard that came with my 2007 iMac. I know, I can still use that with this 27 iMac. That isn’t the point. The point is the new keyboard looks stupid in front of the giant 27 screen.
but the forward/back is not.
Guess which one we all use more? I’ll take awesome scrolling any day.
I just hit command [ ] to go forward and back anyway.
@anthony007
I see your point about keyboard proportion. It doesn’t look quite right next to that big monitor, but it DOES look great on your lap, with your 27″ iMac a few feet away on a TV stand.
When you think about that, and how the new wireless mouse acts as a touchpad when it’s sitting oon the couch next to you (no complaints about 2-finger swiping when your mouse doesn’t slide sideways), you can really see what Apple is up to here.
If that’s not the way you intend to use the iMac, consider the proportion issue to be a great excuse to get another input device to fill the gap (Bamboo or mixer board?).
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Cheers…
@anthony007
By the way, that little aluminum keyboard feels anything but cheap. Go to the Apple Store and check one out – it’s a sweet, solid piece of Apple engineering.
Funny how Apple is touting their green status so aggressively these days and yet opts not to offer a corded (battery-less) model. I guess the batteries their customers are forced to buy and discard don’t count.
No buttons for Expose/dashboard and no corded version = one swipe forward and two swipes back.
great potential… but no center-click/side-squeeze for expose and spaces = no deal. sorry.
@MDN take: WD-40.
Got my Magic Mouse Friday at the Apple Store at La Cantera in San Antonio, and it is an instant hit in our household.
I totally don’t get complaints about the rails making grinding noises, etc. My Magic Mouse makes almost the same exact sounds as my mouse formerly-known-as-Mighty-Mouse.
I’m finding scrolling to be effortless and smooth, much better than the scroll ball, with which I was satisfied.
Yeah, there are definitely trolls venturing out in the neighborhood today.
Rechargable batteries!! I’ve been using the same dozen rechargable batteries for years! You can buy the batteries and chargers all over the place!
We do not totally agree with Bangeman’s assessment of the two-finger swipe. Unless you use a very light touch, two finger swiping can cause the very light Magic Mouse to slide and therefore can be more of a pain than it’s worth
How dare these scumbags at MDN write something critical about an Apple product. This is a Fanboy site, where only sycophantic praise of all things Mac is allowed, coupled with snide attempts to humiliate anyone who dares be anything other than 110% pro Apple. You should be ashamed of yourselves.
PMSL it’s fake Rob.
Hey I’ve been using a corded full size aluminium keyboard on my Mac Pro and one of the smaller Bluetooth ones with the Mac Mini next to it for many months and the handyness of the BT one is awesome. If anything it makes the 27″ iMac look even bigger. Is that such a bad thing? I also use a Wacom Bamboo as a mouse. Mainly because a real mouse was starting to make my wrist ache pretty badly. Well I think it was the mouse!
Hey MDN, the plural of mouse is mice, not mouses. And you can send your ‘retired’ Mighty Mice to me. Thanks.
@Anthony
Anyone who chooses a computer based on its peripherals sounds like a Windows user.