My optical mouse has a bad habit of suddenly zipping to the side of the screen for no reason. It’s a Logitech mouse, if that matters. Anyway, is this a common problem? It seems like the laser suddenly screws up and it thinks I have moved it when I haven’t. It only happens when I actually AM moving it, so the problem may be in that somehow. Should I just get a new mouse or is there something I am doing wrong (e.g. lifting it up too much, using a bad surface, whatever)?
How old is your mouse? Your problem is very common with the first two or three generations of optical mouse. I got one of the first Microsoft ones, which does the screen zipping thing almost 30% of the time I move it. I “fixed” it by buying a newer mouse…
Well what surface are you using? Anything reflective (even in the slightest) can cause that kind of erratic movement.
The first Microsoft Intellimouse Explorer USB is the greatest mouse I have ever used and is still working as wonderfully today as the day I bought it. On my Max Payne mouse pad no less. Not all the old mice suck.
My first couple intellimice did that…
This one (bought recently) does that every once in a while. I’m using a matte “optical mouse pad” with a funky pattern on it.
Yup. Sounds like your mousing surface is causing problems.
What kind of surface should I get instead then? This is slightly reflective. Maybe a straight cloth surface? A lot of the mousepads nowadays seem to use glossy surfaces, or maybe I should stop buying them at Target!
I don’t have that. Instead, I get slow cursor drift when the mouse isn’t moving.
Sorry, but - no. The same piece of sh** that you praise to the skies some day decided to make my computer lock up for a second every other minute. Failing to suspect the devious little input device I replaced most PC parts in order to find the cause. Believe me, it’s evil and deceitful, and someday it will stab you in the back. Never turn your back to a Intellimouse Explorer.
Yes I would recommend a cheapo cloth covered foam pad.
Wholly Schmidt: My crappy mouse is Microsoft Intellimouse with Intellieye 1.0. I think it’s older than yours by at least a year.
Robert Sharp: Just use any non-reflective surface. The new optical mouse works differently than the ones that Sun used. (Those really old ones need special reflective surface pads.) If you’re not using a glass tabletop, just use the tabletop!
Fuck optical mice. I tried all of them fixits on an ol’ Logitech that I had and the fucker still did that stuff. It used to zip to the upper right corner - only the upper right hand corner. While I was typing up a post. And then I’d click and close my fucking browser in themiddle of my post, and well we all know how long those posts can get.
Worse, that optical was after a sordid affair with a cheap Logitech cordless, which was big on phantom clicks. So, I’d be typing a post (again), and then my mouse would spuriously decide to back-click 2 or 3 times, and then I’d do something to change the course of the past as it were, and lose another post.
I went out and bought an MX500 after that stupid optical mouse. I was petrified of buying the MX1000, but it’s been aces.