Lint Won't Stop This Mouse From Roaring
Sydney Morning Herald
Sunday October 19, 1986
THE MOUSE business is beginning to roar. Yet, until recently, cursor-pushing rodents were languishing in the background of the computing scene.
What happened?
If Apple Computers cannot take the credit for inventing the electronic mouse, certainly, the heroic marketing effort known as Macintosh is what made it a household name, at least, among personal computer users.
Yet except in the case of the virtually mouse-dependent Mac, the device has not scrabbled up on to most electronic desks. The main reason it has not is probably that its primary accomplishments are manipulative, whereas most people spend most of their time at the computer entering data.
The one exception I would make involves graphics, particularly in the current desk-top publishing craze. Maybe, that is what is sending mouse sales scurrying? Whatever the cause, I am seeing more and more rodents cosying up to computers these days. And a new breed seems to be in vogue. Both the Mac mouse and Microsoft's equivalent for the IBM PC and its compatibles fall into the mechanical class of devices. They roll around on the desk by means of a bellybutton-like ball, which senses the mouse's movements to propel, in turn, the cursor on the screen. But, of course, it tends to gather lint, and this impairs its performance.
To circumvent this hazard, the new breed_the optical mouse_has arrived, and there are a number of models on the market, including the Summa Mouse($119 from the Summagraphics Corp, Fairfield, Connecticut) and the PC Mouse Bus Plus ($199 from Mouse Systems, Santa Clara, California). Both models are geared to the IBM PC standard.
The optical mouse does not exactly "see", although it does have two"eyes", sensors containing an infrared and a visual red-light source. As the mouse runs back and forth across a surface on the velvet strips serving as its feet, the changes in light reflection it encounters are used to sense its direction and movement. However, this self-orientation can be achieved only with the aid of a special reflective surface, on which is embedded a grid pattern enabling the mouse to count how many steps to the left or upwards, say, you have pushed it. In this reflective pad we find the first difference between the two mice under discussion here.
The pad for the PC mouse is rigid and measures 187mm by 225mm, that for the Summa mouse is slightly larger, 225mm by 275mm, and floppy. The latter takes up more of the precious desk space forming my already overburdened writing platform. I also have my doubts about how durable it is, particularly since the manufacturer warns, "Do not expose mouse pad to direct sunlight for extended periods of time." The PC Mouse comes with a lifetime guarantee, a highly unusual feature in the computer industry.
As to the mice themselves, although they share the same basic shape and mousy brown-grey colour, I definitely prefer the feel of the Summa mouse. Both are three-button species. On each, one button functions as an Escape key, another brings the desired menus up on screen, and the third assumes various roles, depending on the program being run. But the buttons on the Summa mouse are slightly higher and concave, and one's fingers take to them more readily. It is also in some ways the better designed in terms of installation, boasting large knurled knobs on the connector to be plugged into the computer's RS 232C socket, rather than the traditional miniscrews, which inevitably require dexterous fingers and a jeweller's screwdriver.
On the other hand, the Summa mouse requires a separate power cord with transformer to be plugged into its own electrical outlet. Because I am now on my third power strip on one wall outlet, I have a strong built-in aversion to any peripheral demanding either more plugs or more wires. Also, every time you power up the computer, you have to let the the mouse know where it's starting from.
Like all the other mice I've ever seen, these two suffer from perennial tail tangle. The cord connecting them to the computer always seems to be dangling in the wrong place. I often ponder, in the case of such add-ons, the feasibility of a contracting, coiled cord like that used on telephone handsets.
To accommodate a wider range of software than may otherwise be usable, the Summa mouse is outfitted with a Microsoft Mouse Emulator, enabling it to handle any of the programs supporting that standard even when they were not designed with the Summa mouse in mind. The PC mouse sports "designer pop-up menus" and asserts that it, too, can run Microsoft mouseware, as well as PC Paint Plus, a colourful MacDraw-like graphics program that is fun to play around with, even if I still have my doubts about the actual usefulness of such software in general.
I would probably give the Summa Mouse the prize for best rodent and PC Mouse the one for best dressed. In the end, your choice may depend simply on which is more cluttered, the outside or the inside of your computer.
The Summa Mouse does not require an internal board, but plugs into a serial port. However, the computers on the market today have only two communications ports, Com 1 and Com 2. Those who use a lot of peripheral devices may find that reserving one port for a mouse could pose a problem. The PC Mouse Bus Plus comes with its own dedicated mouse port, a small half card to be inserted in an empty computer slot. But even as a half card, this private bus service takes up valuable slot space in what is often an already overcrowded machine.
© 1986 Sydney Morning Herald
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