Computer Mice
| Externals |
| Logitech |
| MS Wheel Mouse |
Amiga Mice
As far as I recall, these were my first experiences with mice in general. The standard Amiga mouse had two square buttons, the contacts of which tended to get worn out and make clicking response increasingly inreliable over time. Experiences of the value of mouse cleaning came right along with these mice as well, since the Amiga manuals were kind enough to provide easy-to-follow cleaning instructions. I seem to have three different Amiga mice in my possession right now, but I'm pretty sure only two of them are really mine. Which means they can't have worn out all that fast after all (if I didn't go through more than two in my Amiga years) ...
Mac Mice
Okay, I don't really have that much experience in this area. The little I have mostly comes from using our old LC II, but there really isn't anything wrong with one button mice. Except of course for the lack of additional buttons ... Compared to the mice above, this one seemed built to last forever, but of course it wasn't subject to the same insane amounts of clicking either. Still, I guess there's quite a bit of quality difference too.
First PC mouse
I don't know where this one is anymore, but it was a no frills mouse of some unknown brand and with two buttons. It worked as expected for a while and then broke down faster than an Amiga mouse ever did, leading to our first entry into the pleasant world of Logitech mice.
Logitech MouseMan
Dad brought this one home when the above mouse wouldn't cooperate anymore, and it turned out to be a very nice choice. A whopping three buttons it had, and the middle one could be set to preform lots of handy functions when clicked. I didn't use that much for quite a while, not until I realized the tremendous convenience of using it for double click. That discovery made it very hard to even look at a two-button mouse again, or three-button ones without that function set for that matter.
Microsoft Wheel Mouse
The next computer brought further convenience in the form of our first wheel mouse. Not only could it do the middle-button-acting-as-double-click-trick, the wheel scrolled windows for you too! Just three buttons weren't convenient enough anymore, suddenly I was dependent on a wheel too for comfortable computing. For a while, it seemed that there was no reason to miss the Logitech logo, it was only other people who complained that the wheel was quite sluggish. For a while. Then it became almost impossible to scroll up without accidentally clicking at the same time, and down was only slightly better. So basically this started off as a wheel mouse and ended up being a three-button mouse ...
Logitech Pilot Wheel Mouse
This was the one I chose to go with my first computer, spending a few crowns extra to get a wheel instead of just three buttons. Said wheel was a wonder of smoothness after our old MS Wheel Mouse, and the double-click assignment was immediately made too. However, at this time I had started noting an increasing number of games putting the middle mouse button to use, and that wouldn't work if it was assigned some special function. So, in a rare step back, the double-click had to go in favour of increased game functionality somewhere around the end of 2000. Apart from this I haven't had a single problem with this mouse that hasn't been resolved by some proper cleaning. Still, better things lured just around the corner. Optical mice, meaning no need to ever clean them or have them wear out. Force feedback mice that didn't require to be mounted on their surface. Optical mice with force feedback was getting tempting ...
Logitech iFeel Mouse
... so now I suddenly find myself with an iFeel on my desk. My first optical mouse, my first force feedback mouse and also my first USB mouse. The last thing was more fun than I expected, since it let both mice be connected at once. The cool bit is that Logitech's drivers also let both mice work at once, so now I can switch at will or let people fight over control of the cursor if I like. Not too useful perhaps, but quite fun :-) ... Maybe I can get two pointers too? That might even prove useful somehow ...
Haven't tried out or played around with the force feedback very much yet, so far I've mostly enjoyed the novelty of having it in windows. The forces aren't as strong as I expected, but I'm thinking that this might be a good thing, too strong forces would perhaps become just annoying and bad for precision. I need to experiment more with this!
