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Mouse Uses RFID Instead of Batteries
ValourX writes "NewsForge (part of OSTG, like Slashdot) has a review of a mouse that is powered by RFID (and yes, it works with Linux). It's cordless and uses no batteries -- you just have to keep the mouse within 2 inches of the mousepad for it to work. What else could be powered by RFID?"
The statement that the mouse is powered by RFID is a bit of a misnomer. It may be RF that transmits the mouse movement, but it is actually Inductive Coupling. The mouse pad has a coil that transfers power to a coil in the mouse using magnetic flux. This transfer of power is limited to short distances. Passive RFID uses radio frequency to transmit the power to the tag and relay the information back to the "server". I think that using inductive coupling for Mouse power is a great idea! Anything to reduce consumption of batteries that wind up in a landfill.
All the worlds indeed a
One, it's not RFID. RFID is a means of identifying things, that happens to use the RF from the detector as a power source. You can use RF as a power source without it being RFID.
Two, bateryless cordless mice are old news. I've got a Graphire 2 next to me that's done that thing for three or four years.
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no batteries just charge it once a week
;-)
And, since there's no battery, you're charging... magical gnomes?
You can't take the sky from me...
The mouse pad cannot be operated on any metal surface. Since the warnings about this are printed on the box, in the manual, and on the mouse pad itself, I figured it was in my best interest to avoid finding out why metal and power-over-RFID don't mesh.
Well there's a sentence that sure didn't end the way I wanted it to... Where's his sense of adventure?
No thanks, I'll stick with an truly wireless mouse.
I've seen a couple posts where people have said "Hey, the first optical mouse let me throw away the pad." and have just got to drop a quick note here.
I have several optical mice that *need* their pad, as it has a grid for the optics to read as you draw the mouse across it. So it took them awhile to figure out how to get the optical mouse to work with no pad. Just as it will take them awhile to figure out how to give the entire population of the Earth cancer by using Inductive style power beamed from satellites to power those mice.
"Genius may shine aloof and alone, like a star, but goodness is social, and it takes two men and God to make a Brother."
(a) This has nothing to do with RFID, as the parent stated.
(b) Mice powered by induction from a special mousepad (or top-of-the-mousepad) have been around for a very long time. Presumably these didn't catch on for the same reason that optical mice that required a mousepad with a grid didn't catch on -- people don't like being forced to have a particular mousepad.
(c) Tesla owns your ass, mouse-people -- he powered lamps with remotely transmitted power twenty-five miles away.
Any program relying on (nontrivial) preemptive multithreading will be buggy.