The Wireless USB Mouse Tail
The tale I have to tell is one of a Wireless Computer Mouse that needed a tail.
Several months ago, I bought a wireless optical mouse in the US that is branded under the name Wenger. Wenger also happen to be the makers of the genuine Swiss Army knife known throughout the world for its good design, quality, precision and fine craftsmanship.
I mention design, quality and precision in particular, as these have some bearing on what happened after I started using this wireless mouse named "The Daytona."
Even the name “Daytona” suggests speed and endurance after the famous NASCAR Daytona 500 car race.
But this wireless computer mouse did not live up to it’s Daytona name for endurance, since after only 3 weeks when it was used very little, it required 2 new batteries.
OK, I thought, perhaps the batteries that came with the product were not at there best, so I popped in two more batteries, but this time wrote the date on them to be sure I was not imagining things.
Sure enough after about another 3 weeks the same problem, the mouse starts flashing a little red optical light telling me the batteries are low.
Ah ha I think to myself this wireless mouse must be faulty because no one would produce a computer mouse that eats batteries at the rate of almost one a week.
It was not as if the mouse was being asked to do much work, just for maybe two hours a day and the rest of the time it was allowed to sleep. By sleep I mean it switched itself off after not being in use for maybe 5 minutes or less.
Since I bought the wireless computer mouse during a trip to the US, taking it back to the shop for a replacement was out of the question.
Instead I contacted the company licensed to distribute the mouse under the Wenger name – AvenuesUSA.com.
The first gem of wisdom I was offered from their support desk was and I quote
“To preserve battery power, place the receiver into the cavity on the bottom of the mouse when it is not in use.”
So users of this wireless usb mouse are expected to fumble around at the back of their PC to unplug the usb receiver every time the mouse is not being used – does that sound like a user friendly design to you.
After further moronic replies from their technical support desk and a week of emails, they finally agreed to send me a replacement mouse. In fact they sent me two, a new Daytona wireless optical mouse and “The Diablo” an enhanced precision mouse.
Unfortunately the replacement Daytona mouse had no more endurance than the last one and the Diablo was far from being precise. In fact it was the worst example of a precision computer mouse I have ever seen. The mouse pointer jumped and jerked all over the screen like a thing possessed.
Not to be deterred, I decided to overcomes the mouse’s (or should I say mice) appetite for batteries my giving my mouse a tail.
The tail connects it to its very own power supply, so no longer would I have to change batteries every 3 weeks.
The only reason I bought this mouse was for my wife’s PC. She was using an old style roller ball mouse on a mouse mat that constantly needed degreasing.
The optical mouse solves this problem since it does not have a roller ball and does not need to have contact with a mouse mat.
I have to report that during the extensive and lengthy surgery performed on the mouse to connect a tail, one of them died and I was unable to revive it.
However the surviving mouse is doing well, as you can see in this post-op picture.
Perhaps I should no longer call it wireless optical usb mouse since it has a wire (tail).
Maybe I could call it a ‘Withwire Optical USB Mouse’ or a ‘Wiremore Computer Mouse,’ or perhaps a ‘Batteryless Optical Mouse.’
One thing I know for sure, I would strongly suggest you don’t buy one.
Tony Simpson
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