- OK. When I was setting up the Teacher Syndicate, I didn’t realize that wireless, battery operated mice and keyboards last about week, if used for 3-4 hours a day. My 16 hour days made them start acting strangely around lunchtime.
- I'm moving onto finger mice. Most of my work is done on my couch and both my wireless and BlueTooth mice kept falling off. My regular wired mouse works fine on the couch, but falls off when I am not using it. I've heard I can type and finger mouse at the same time. Sounds perfect.
- There’s a few more issues with wireless technology.
- Interference – they’ll pick up any lose signals in your neighborhood. Wireless access points, telephones, vacuum cleaners. These affect their accuracy. And when you are trying to find that funny arrow in Word that selects a row, you want accuracy.
- Precision – a mouse or keyboard should be very accurate and responsive. A good mouse should have a resolution of 1,000 dots per inch, which means sending a lot of information to your computer about its movement. A keyboard should remember every combination of keys, even if you typed them while the computer was busy, and the keyboard has to catch up. Cheaper wireless mice and keyboards do not have so much accuracy.
- The Lag. My mouse has almost been saying “Hey, I’ll get around to moving when I’m ready!” I tend to edit videos, pictures, make websites and listen to music at the same time. In the hierarchy of importance, my wireless mouse always was way down the list, and would move when everything else was finished.
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- Generally, the same rules for keyboards apply to mice. It’s easy for them to get filthy, but luckily they are much easier to clean.
- Two things to consider when buying a mouse are (1) should I buy a wireless mouse and (2) what sort of mouse accuracy do I need?
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- Let’s start with wireless mice that use a radio frequency to communicate to a 'base' module you plug into your computer. Unlike a wireless keyboard, a wireless mouse generates a LOT of data.
- Every movement, every speed, every starting and stopping point and every combination of key presses and movement must be converted to code, then sent to the computer. Wireless mice, used for about 4 hours a day, will need their batteries changed weekly. Otherwise the mouse will become slow, inaccurate and start causing problems. It will become your worst nightmare. Wireless mice also suffer from the “yeah, I’ll get around to it” attitude from computers. If you are printing, watching a movie or rendering a claymation series, your computer will automatically assign the lowest priority to your wireless mouse. I don’t know why this happens, but it is certainly annoying.
- Wireless mice also take up a lot more computer power to receive the signal, which you should take into consideration if you have a laptop running on battery power.
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- If you are using a laptop with a BlueTooth mouse, realize this will impact on your battery life as well.
- Bluetooth transmissions are usually more accurate and much more secure than wireless mice. Some laptops have BlueTooth built right in, so you can just turn the mouse on and make a BlueTooth pairing (a short process you need to go through).
- A BlueTooth mouse is also quite good if you have more than one computer you regularly use. You can take your BlueTooth mouse to your desktop, laptop, PDA and UMPC.
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- The second concept you need to think about is accuracy of your mouse. Hopefully your school won’t have any ball-based mice anymore. So you will either have optical or laser models.
- Optical models shine a general red or blue LED onto a surface and track how it is reflected while it moves. Cheap, wireless optical mice usually have a resolution of 500 dots per inch (dpi). This means that as you move the mouse, it can send back 500 coordinates for every square inch. This sounds great, but it will cause problems in art/design software and any software requiring fast mouse movement and critical placement of data entry. Better mice have resolutions up to 1,500 dpi and you can certainly tell the difference if you need to trace a line around someone’s face in an art application, or you like moving your mouse around quickly and expect it to keep up.
- This novelty mouse won't have the best accuracy, but it might be great for early childhood education, as part of a classroom or school theme, or to induce reluctant students to use the computer.
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- Laser mice shine a small and harmless laser onto a surface, which gives much more accuracy than a LED used in an optical mouse.
- Laser mice are obviously more accurate and can deal with higher levels of data accuracy more easily.
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- A lot of the time your mouse problems aren’t with the mouse, but with the mouse mat.
- Mats serve two purposes (1) to keep the mouse moving freely and (2) to provide a surface to reflect light off (and 3, to look good, of course).
- The second point here is the most important. If your mouse relies on picking up reflected signals, a mouse mat which interferes with those reflections is going to drive you crazy. These include any mats with white/black patterns, large text or high contrast images. Ultra-shiny mats in either very white or very black shades may also send back overly reflected or split signals. The best mouse mats are matte, slightly cushioned and have no or low-contrast patterns. As desks are usually scratched and/or dirty, it is not recommended that you place a mouse directly on its surface. The best mouse mats, for all types of mice, are the super-cheap plain mats sold at places like Ikea or any other generic supplier.
- I do however agree with wrist cushions, especially if you have young children using a mouse for any period of time.
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- If your mouse starts getting hard to move, you can always replace the synthetic pads that help it slide. This is a much easier option to get your mouse feeling like new again, especially if someone regularly maintains your equipment once a year.
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- Some mice and mats do more than just be a mouse or a mat. Mice can conceal Skype phones, USB hubs and more. Mats can be paired with USB hubs, microphones, speakers and lights. I prefer a mat to be a mat, as a lot of the time I go over the edge, where if my mat was surrounded by multi-media, it would limit my extra-move
- Graphics tablets are great for capturing student's "live" handwriting, especially if you are sharing an electronic whiteboard or video conference notepad over the internet. Trying to replicate hand-writing with a mouse is a nightmare. Look for a tablet that is easy to use, is small (you don't need big, believe me) and doesn't need drivers.
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Links to the shop:
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