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Hmmm... Upgrades

I've been having trouble with my mouse lately, with it not correctly tracking as I move it. So I decided it was either the mouse, a Logitech MX700, or the mouse mat, an Everglide Giganta, which I have warn smooth in places. To try to identify the problem I put a peice of white paper on the mouse mat and used that as my mousing surface for a few days. That improved things so I decided to try sanding the surface of the mat (it's plastic) with rough sand paper to see if that made things any better (it's not working, so what's the worst that could happen?) Well, that improved things a bit not good enough. It was about this time that the mouse started flashing red, well, the LED on top did at least and that indicated that the batteries were getting low. Now, considering that the mouse in on its charger all night and should go seveeral days without a charge that suggested that the batteries weren't holding a charge. Great. So, I decided that it was time for a change: I've always liked the Logitech MX1000 and ebuyer had a shiny black version in stock (normally they only come in a sort of satin blue). I should mention at this point that another nail in the MX700s coffin was that the satin silver finish was coming off both from where my fingers rest on the buttons and where the charging cradle rubs the back of the mouse while it's charging. So I was (am) hoping that the shiny finish will be longer wearing. What's so good about the MX1000 over the MX700? It's got a frickin' laser, it's got sideways scrolling, the application switch button (think one-button Alt-Tab) is by your thumb rather than under your palm like it is on the '700 (Logitech engineers must have weird hands; no palm, all fingers), it's got a frickin' laser (I like that), it's really fast and accurate and it wakes-up instantly from standby. It's also got a three-bar LED power meter which is good, but not essential (laser). Oh yea, and unlike the latest Logitech mice, it still has forward and back navigation buttons whereas the newer ones only have one button, an I like having forward and back easy to get to like that.

Right, that's the mouse, now for the mouse mat. A bit of research revealed... that there's no real concensus. So I looked for something hard wearing and came up with this, an Icemat 2nd Edition in black. It's made of glass! It's big and smooth and hopefully will last for a long time. It also comes with a set of pre-cut 'skates' that attach to the pads on the bottom of the mouse to help it glide better. The MX1000 tracks perfectly on it.

Okay, I've got more stuff to cover, like iPod cases, speakers, lightscribe and Sky's new delivery system but that'll do for now.

posted by Tim @ 7:35 pm