Comments on: Apple Magic Mouse Review

By: UtahRugbyGuy

UtahRugbyGuy — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 13:54:33 +0000

Square corners could become uncomfortable? Yeah, if you have tiny hands of a 3 year old and you’re gripping the entire mouse in the palm of your hand as tight as you can …seriously? The thing is tiny and your fingers barely touch the sides. I’ve been using it for a while now and I’ve never even noticed the “sharp” edges.

…and I love all the functionality, etc. Overall a great mouse. Way better than the Mighty Mouse’s cheesy little scroll wheel that got clogged every 5 minutes.

However, there are sometimes some surprising tracking issues like in Illustrator or Photoshop, when you go to circle something while selecting it and it takes a few seconds, when you let go, all the sudden the screen starts spinning around, tracking the circular path your mouse was on while making the selection and it takes a couple seconds to catch up …and worst case scenario, sometimes my artwork ends up off the screen until I scroll back up a few inches. …and it doesn’t happen all the time. A couple times a day. Some worse than others.

Not a big deal, just a minor annoyance when I’m designing on my Mac Pro.

…and Apple claims battery life lasts 4 months or 800 non-stop minutes??? Yeah, right. The most I’ve ever got out of it is about 18 – 20 days. …another minor inconvenience if you did what I did and get a AA battery charger and some rechargeable batteries and keep rotating the batteries. Just swap them out in all of 10 seconds …but then it takes another 15 – 20 seconds for bluetooth to find it again when you turn it back on.

…I suppose if you turn off the power switch at night (otherwise, it goes into sleep mode), you may get a few more days out of it but just be sure to turn the mouse on before your computer or you’ll be waiting without a mouse and nothing to do for like 30 seconds while your bluetooth finds it.

Again, a couple minor inconveniences but all-in-all, I’ve loved it …I just hope the performance lasts.

By: billiemac

billiemac — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 00:48:06 +0000

I love the magic mouse , but on pdf the vertical motion zooms where normaly it scrolls.
Is this adjustable? I am running 10.5.8 on an intel mac tower

By: New User

New User — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 08:06:31 +0000

Three days ago I took the plunge and purchased the new iMac. My first and subsequent impressions of the magic mouse are not favorable. Vertical scrolling takes much patience and precision scrolling is beyond my ability. When scrolling through a multipage PDF file scrolling to the next page is quit the challenge. The mouse should, in my opinion, be an extension of my thought process and not another piece of hardware to fight with. So, I’m enjoying the computer but have replaced the magic mouse with my existing multi-button Logitech. By the way, my battery life shows only 83%, after three days. To get four months on a set of batteries I would have to let it sit for three months.

By: Mr. Nobody

Mr. Nobody — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 01:07:43 +0000

I just got a Magic Mouse–the battery life is nowhere NEAR 4 months–not on its default settings, anyway. I found myself replacing my first set of AA batteries in just under 2 weeks, and it’s sucked its way through 15% of the new ones over the last couple of days.

By: Harry D

Harry D — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 22:57:38 +0000

I am on the second mouse they sent me now as I discovered the functionality is NOWHERE as good for the left handed option as the right. I just got off the phone with a product development specialist from Apple who fortunately as a left hander herself completely understood the problem ! She is going to do a deep dive into the issue and press for a software update which will result in the left handers having the same exceptional sensitivity when clicking as the righties .. Until then , if your a lefty .. be prepared to click like a right hander for a while .. or wait a few months until this bug is fixed.

By: Ray

Ray — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 00:56:44 +0000

I tried it at the Apple Store and liked it and boutght it. Unfortunately the new software is problematic for some of the Macs I tried. It does not install on some of the older intel macbooks and the 17″ intel IMac that I tried. Talked to Apple Support twice and they are getting a number of such reports. They said that an update to the software would be coming but they did not know when.

By: Janine

Janine — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 23:41:18 +0000

For me, ergonomics always trumps function in a mouse – if it’s not comfortable, forget it. And based on the comments, I have my doubts about plunking down $69 for this mousie. Thanks for the useful review.

By: Terry White

Terry White — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 14:18:03 +0000

Hi PK,
Thanks!
Core Duo was the first multi-core intel processor used in the Mac
Core 2 Duo was the next version of that processor and it’s definitely FASTER.
Dual core is the same thing. It means 2 processors
Quad core means TWO Dual Core/Core 2 Duo processors. So you end up with 2 chips that contain 4 processors total.
Hope that helps.

By: pk

pk — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 14:13:19 +0000

Terry,

I have been reading your blog for quite sometime. Great information so thank you very much for sharing your know how and knowledge. I was reading your earlier review of new Mac goodies. I have had this question nagging me for quite some time. What’s the difference in core2 duo, core duo, dual core? It seems like Intel names these things so it can confuse more than help.

Thanks,
pk.

By: Terry White

Terry White — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 01:30:52 +0000

Works fine. I’ve been lifting and dragging all day. No side buttons, so no issue there.

By: Mick Mueck

Mick Mueck — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 01:09:08 +0000

One thing that really bugged me with the mighty mouse was that when you clicked the mouse the whole top went down rather than the immediate region you depressed with your finger as within every other mouse. The down side to that was that when you lifted the mouse while dragging an icon, the mouse mechanically unclicked and the software had to take over. Very often when lifting the mouse while dragging I would also end up squeezing the mouse a little harder and unintentionally activate the side buttons.
So what happens with this mouse when you click, drag and then have to lift it while continuing to drag?

By: Damien

Damien — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 17:11:55 +0000

I went to the Apple store the other day and played around with the new magic mouse. It felt a bit small for my hand, but it also glides quite nice across the table. I love the fact that they put some aluminum on the mouse, it looks that much better sitting next to the other mac products. I’ll be grabbing one when they arrive in the stores, yes I drink the kool-aid.

By: Barbarossa

Barbarossa — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 16:15:03 +0000

I had hoped that the new Magic Mouse would have the same functionality as my old (but still in use) Kensington ADB “ThinkingMouse.” Although there is no scroll wheel, the four symmetrical buttons give me six programmable clicks. For me it’s the best time saver since learning how to type.

With the Magic Mouse, I had envisioned a touch surface that could, since it knew where your finger was, be programmed for 1, 2, 3, 4 or 6 buttons and yet still have vertical and horizontal scrolling. The Kensington ‘MowseWorks’ software has had that functionality (6 buttons + scroll) for years now, but no touch surface mouse, or even a mouse that even resembled the old ThinkingMouse.

Apple now has a touch surface mouse but, Alas! no proper software to take advantage of the mouse.

By: Terry White

Terry White — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 15:52:01 +0000

On the newer MacBook Pro’s, yes you can do a right click right on the trackpad. It’s called Secondary Click in the Trackpad Prefs. No middle click though.

By: Chris

Chris — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 15:45:07 +0000

Cool.. is there any way on my macbook pro’s touch pad to have a middle click or right click?