Slashdot Mirror
Silent Mice for Silent PCs?
UnrefinedLayman asks: "In the quest for a silent PC, one item that seems to be consistently overlooked is the mouse: it's one of the more noisy computer components if only by virtue of the fact that it is a staccato noise. I don't notice my fans or hard drives very often, given that they are constant background sounds whose levels don't noticeably change. My mouse, on the other hand, makes a very audible *click* each time I use it, and while providing a pleasant tactile feedback, it keeps my girlfriend awake during my late-night work sessions. So I turn to the Ask Slashdot community: have you found a silent mouse for your silent PC? Numerous Google searches have yielded
little. It's not as though it's impossible, as touch pads for laptops have been around for quite some time, and the iPod makes great use of the technology. ThinkGeek also sells a force-free keyboard with a "mouse replacement" built into it, but while the keyboard technology looks very promising, I prefer to stick with a mouse (not to mention something a bit cheaper). Mouse manufacturers have long touted optical mice as being superior to their trackball cousins for having no moving, mechanical parts, but it seems like they're overlooking the most obvious and still mechanical function: the buttons themselves! So what say you Slashdot? Are there force-free, truly non-mechanical and silent mice out there to be had?"
It's been my experience thast the mice doen't need to click.
They usually have a clicker switch.
What if you took a cheep mouse, opened it and replaced the clicker-switcheswith normal ones?
This may not be a practical suggestion, but it came to my mind as I was reading this, since I have dabbled in some minor electronics and case modification in the last while... if one knew what they were doing, perhaps one could modify an existing mouse to replace the existing microswitch with something else, perhaps a IR emitter/sensor which is blocked by a tab when the mouse button is pressed. That would eliminate the clicking sound of the microswitch.
... though could be interesting trying to rest your
finger on there.
:)
Or perhaps a touchplate
One would have to consult someone more experienced in building this sort of stuff regarding feasibility though.
-- Silhouette
When I started reading, that was the first thing I thought. Then, as I was reading on, it occurred to me the guy was serious.
I mean, come on. How hard is it to replace a high tech item like a switch under a mouse button, with a switch that does not do *click*?
The sound has a function in most cases. It's a signal. Even using a mouse button is referred to as clicking. It also prevents arthritis. You do not need to apply more pressure than to make the click, thus preventing excessive wear the finger joints.
I once had a mouse where one of the mouse buttons had been repaired, and it was replaced with a silent switch (amiga mouses were expensive). I repaired it again, this time with a clicking switch. YMMV.
the pun is mightier than the sword
Touchpads usually can be set up so a tap on the pad signals a click.
For example, I do a bit of multitrack digital recording. The mouse clicks can be a distraction when you're trying to get an artist to focus on the *song*, not the recording of the song.
I have yet to find a way to use the keyboard to select a point in a recording where one wishes to punch in...
Dave O'Heare
It's worse than that. The buttons are so sensitive that picking up the mouse and setting it back down will cause them to click. Resting your fingers on them normally will hold them down. This is difficult to get used to. Eventually you learn to keep your fingers hovered slightly above the buttons and you compensate for not being able to pick up the mouse by cranking up the sensitivity high enough so that you never need to.
One unfortunate thing I was never able to figure out is how to get the buttons to click rapidly. Since there is virtually no tactile feedback to clicking it's hard to tell if you're actually clicking or just holding the button down without really exaggerating the finger motion involved.
There's a much bigger problem: I had three older Razer Boomslangs (before they went bankrupt, or whatever happened). The first one I actually bought, and it broke the day I got it. Razer, thankfully, had a rather good return policy, and had a new one on the way after about 5 minutes on the phone.
My second Razer lasted through a couple months of off and on usage. The difficulty of rapidly clicking the buttons made pistol shooting in CS a major pain in the ass, so I kept switching it with my IntelliMouse Optical. Finally it just stopped working one day. The mouse would only move vertically and the primary button would not work. Another call to Razer, 5 minutes, and another mouse was on the way.
The final Razer lasted about a week of me forcing myself to use it exclusively. Just as I was getting used to it, it fell off my desk. The mouse wheel became jammed inside the mouse, and even when I freed it so that it would rotate properly it was no longer functional. I didn't bother to replace this one.
There's a lot of upside to the mouse, it's incredibly smooth and accurate. There is really no comparing it to standard consumer mice in that respect. You want headshots, to be a railgun god, or just be incredibly precise in your Photoshop work? You can't beat it. It's good enough that, despite my problems with it, I'm thinking of buying one of their new models just to see if they've fixed their problems.
Unfortunately, if you can't count on them to last more than a week at a time they aren't worth much. I've stepped on, dropped, thrown, and even backed over IntelliMouse Optical mice with my car and had them work perfectly afterwards. I don't expect every mouse to handle that, but one that can't handle falling off a desk on some carpet is just unacceptable. Oh, and once you get used to optical mice, going back to cleaning a ball is just annoying.
My advice: if you decide to buy one, buy two. You'll need the second one while you wait for the first one to be replaced. Also, prepare to forget a bunch of your mousing habits if your current ones aren't compatible with what the mouse likes.
Game... blouses.
this company sells supposedly clickless mice for gaming, whether that might meet your needs, dunno
http://www.rotokiller.com/rtr720.html