Slashdot Mirror
Gyroscopic Wireless Mouse
An anonymous reader writes "This is a must for any game player. Gyration has introduced a working wireless gyroscopic mouse. The $119.95 price tag is a little steep but it works with Linux and it doubles for an optical mouse if placed on the desktop. There is an article about it at Linux Journal." We mentioned an earlier version a year or two ago.
I tought this is an old product. Friend of mine has it. Fry's electronics carries it.
people use it for presentations. Steady and accurate it is not. I can't think of a gamer who would use this.
My days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle...
Of course any decent Occ. Health and Safety expert will tell you not to rest your wrist on the table when using a mouse.
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
So you're talking about the "glove mouse" from Minority Report? If they can make an AH-64's guns/sensors move in synch with the pilot's helmet, they can probably do this. Put some IR sensors around the perimeter of your screen, and voila. But it would be expensive.
If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
Up/downl
Left/right
Forward/backward
Pitch
Rol
Yaw
Could do it, but it doesn't sound like it. Would be pretty neat for 3-D model design work, I'd think.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
I just set up my always-connected mouse "CorePointer" and my sometimes-connected one as "AlwaysCore"... Then they both work.
Do you really need reason for beer? Wingman Brewers
Serious gamers don't even use optical mice (with the exception of Logitech's dual-sensor models), to say nothing of gyroscopic wireless hoo-ha. Optical mice don't track well when you make lots of fast twitch movements.
No, this thing is targeted squarely at the PowerPoint set. (Not that I'd turn one down; it'd be perfect for an HTPC setup.)
-Isaac
I am not a lawyer, and this is not legal advice. For Entertainment Purposes Only.
/me runs to USPTO to file.
Fakespace beat you to it
"They redundantly repeated themselves over and over again incessantly without end ad infinitum" -- ibid.
Didn't someone mod a powerglove to do something like this a while back, i remember something about it on here. Also a sibling post mentioned it, pair this with a projector and a piece of treated glass (i remember someone figuring out how to do this, but i cant find a link, anybody?) for a minority report like interface... found the /. link to the powerglove thing...
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
This is rated as "funny" so I'd just like to say that I play games, and I _do_ notice a wireless delay [with all wireless mice that I've tried] (that's the _only_ reason I'm still using a wired mouse).
"If anything can go wrong, it will." - Murphy
It's awesome as a presentation tool, but far too sensitive for first person shooters.
I've used one of these for over 6 months (the old 25 ft range version).
I've got a logitech wireless keyboard and mouse duo, and however hard I try, I'm not noticing the behaviour you described - of course it's not the same make, so there are probably differences between manufacturers and models. I'm an avid FPS player myself, and if anything, the wireless mouse has made it a better experience.
;)
For me personally, the wireless keyboard and mouse have been the best investment in hardware ever. no more wires on my desk, no more messing with trying to find the best route for the keyboard cable, and no more pulling the mouse wire and trying to keep it in a position, where my mouse movement is unimpaired by it
Linux support should be fine; to the OS the base station looks like a USB hub with a plain-vanilla 3-button USB wheelmouse. If you have the wireless keyboard that appears to be hooked to the hub too.
I've had that mouse (and the keyboard, although that is a new, larger keyboard, mine is TINY) for over a year and it works GREAT! I love it! I use it mostly on desk, not with the gyro, but when I want Gyro its amazing... I mainly use it for gaming with RTS and it doesn't work well with FPS. Wonderful product
"If they existed, they would be here already." - Enrico Fermi
Just bought one of each of these (Gyration Ultra) for our church - for remote presentation. Bought the 100 foot "Pro" version and the 30 foot version, for two differently sized rooms. Basically, they work exactly as advertised - tilt and yaw motions control the cursor. If you don't hold down the "trigger" on the bottom, nothing happens when in midair. That is good, because you can release the trigger and use just the buttons for forward/back slide control in PowerPoint, without moving the cursor around.
You can also use it on a desk as an optical. Shape's a little ackward for that - rather a tall but narrow mouse to accomodate the recess for the trigger underneath. Otherwise, works great. Even has a scrollwheel.
Surprisingly, it takes very little getting used to - as they state in the ads, you just move your hand naturally and the cursor follows your motions. But it is prone to overcontrol because moving your hand in midair is less precise than the tiny motions on the desktop (in my case, I move the desktop mouse about 3" for full left/right tracking).
Another couple points - it's got a recharging stand, so it doesn't eat batteries; both versions come with a second battery pack; the Pro version also has a separate charger for the backup battery, and the Pro version also includes a AA-battery pack for emergencies. And both include a USB-powered receiver. Finally, the things worked out of the box with WinXP - no drivers to install. Really a pleasure to hook up and use in seconds.
So really, it works like it's advertised - perhaps even better - which is a rarity these days!
--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
and put the buttons in the hand or on the table, better yet tie button press in with a command to voice recognition softare, and you've got a decent head pointer. Most other head pointers cost more (some far more) and require a reflective dot on your head and a camera to track it. There is a cheap hack of one at www.mousevision.com. But a good, cheap gyro head pointer would be greatly welcomed by the disabled.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
Have you tried the Logitech MX700? An amazing advance over everything else I've ever tried. Extreme sensitivity, massive bandwidth mouse to receiver(comparatively), and recharges the battery while it's in the cradle. That last made the choice for me. I couldn't see paying for something that was going to die on me mid-frag fest, and cost me more in batteries. I've never had the MX700 run out of battery power on me, of course I'm not as young as I used to be...
"Unheard of means only it's undreamed of yet,
Impossible means not yet done." ~~ Julia Ecklar
Is it just the Linux drivers that are new? Because I have owned this mouse for like 4 months now (and the keyboard) and I don't see a newer one on the site. And it's 99.99, not 119.95, and you can get just the mouse for 79.99 from CC. Oh, and it's an awesome mouse, but I can't use it for games. I need the control a regular optical mouse offers. The rechargable batteries work really well, too. Now that there are Linux drivers, I guess I'll try it on my new box, too!
Coming from a past where I worked in a store that sold these, I can tell you the #1 reason for them coming back was gamers. It was to hard to use for extended periods of time, and it wasnt nearly as comfortable. I'd recommend it for the business users, web surfers and technogeeks.
This motion is not cancelled out when the user turns their head back, as they usually tilt their head in the opposite direction before turning, and so the vertical motion continues in the same direction.
Therefore, turning your head left then right usually results in your viewpoint zig-zagging up or down the screen. In in the end, I wrote freelook, to accomodate my head-tracking needs.
We started using the Gyropoint mice in our classrooms in 2002, and the suites in 2003. They are fantastic in a classroom setting especially when coupled with a projector and a large screen. The students can create their assignments/presentations and post them in a common location (public folder). Then one student logs into the projector computer, and you pass the mouse around when it is each student's turn to present their work to the class. The bad points: These are not fast responding mice, and it is tricky to do fine control with them while they are in the air. Using them for gaming will get you fragged quick. If you mess with the channels (between the base and the mouse/keyboard) prepare to send some time to get it working again (change channel, go to learn/teach mode, fail, repeat 7 times). We have had a couple go bad, one with a bad battery, one just died, so you might want to have some spares on hand. There are two versions of the suites, one has a smaller keyboard (and is more expensive), the other has a full size keyboard. You can pick up the mouse alone for about $80 (US$), and the suites go for $100 and $120.
I've got a dozen of this exact model in classrooms across the campus- I put them there last summer. We've had older versions (ball mouse) in place for ~3 years. Those are more expensive and have a much longer (~100 foot) range, but this isn't exactly a new product.
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
you don't use it holding your arm out. You use it with your hand resting on your lap. You move your hand barely a half an inch and the curor moves over half the screen. try it you'll like it.