|
Updated
on October 31, 2001 by Thomas
McGuire
 One of the most
overlooked components of a PC is also the most common. That
device is the Mouse. Getting tired of your current mouse
& it’s rather lack lustre handling? Well, don’t
replace it just yet. You can do a surprising amount of
things with your mouse to make it feel like it’s new once
again. Be it improved scrolling, better responsiveness to
input or just more customized to your requirements.
Cleaning
Those
of you still using ball based mice, such as the an
Intellimouse Pro may find that after a few weeks of use your
mouse tends to get less responsive than it used to be. This
is most likely due to dirt on the rollers (not a problem
with optical mice). To clean your rollers & get that
smoothness back in the mouse you should use the following
procedure.
1.
Turn
your mouse over & remove the plastic mouse ball cover
(It should only need to be twisted until it drops off).
2.
Remove
the mouse ball after the cover comes off, you should clean
& dry this, water should do just fine. Make sure you dry
the ball thoroughly however. Place it to one side after its
been cleaned.
3.
Check
the space where the mouse ball used to be located; there
should be a number of rollers here. These will need to be
cleaned of any built-up dirt.
4.
Depending
on whatever tools you have available e.g. A small knife or
cotton bud, use it to remove any built-up dirt on the
rollers (generally it will form a thin film around the
centre of the roller). Do this until all rollers are clean
once again.
5.
Blow/Shake
out any dust from inside the mouse, this will clear out any
of the dirt that may have fallen back inside the mouse
during the roller cleaning.
6.
Re-insert
the cleaned mouse ball & re-screw the mouse ball cover
on tightly. It may be a good idea to clean your mouse pad
now too (Depending on the material it’s made from).
7.
You
should make sure no dirt is stuck to the tabs underneath
your mouse also; clean this dirt off as required. This will
further improve tracking smoothness.
8.
The
cleaning is now finished, depending on how dirty the mouse
ball rollers were in the first place you should see a
noticeable improved in mouse responsiveness.
Repeat
this procedure every month/few weeks or so, this should keep
your mouse movement ultra smooth.
Mouse
pads
Almost
all of you out there will be resting your mouse on a mouse
pad (Expect some of you with optical mice, perhaps). A mouse
pad plays quite an important part in how well you mouse can
be used. Although with the advent of optical mice the mouse
pad is slightly less important than it used to be.
From
my own experience I can highly recommend the Everglide
Giganta Mouse pad. Having a good mouse pad can
significantly improve your ability to navigate the desktop
or improve aim (or rather accuracy) in games & such.
Drivers
For starters you should
update your mouse drivers/software. Microsoft Mouse owners
can download the latest Intellipoint software from Microsoft,
the latest Logitech Mouseware can be downloaded Logitech
& the latest Razer
Boomslang drivers here.
These generally contain improved functionality &/or
various bug fixes.
To ensure the latest
drivers are actually installed you should use the following
procedure. Right click on My Computer select Properties
then;
If you are using Windows
2000/XP select the Hardware tab, then Device
Manager. Open Mouse and other pointing devices
then select your mouse & hit the Properties
button. Select the Driver tab.
Select the Update
Driver button & run through the Update driver
wizard. Select the x:\WINNT\INF folder (Substitute x
with the appropriate Driver letter) as the location to
search (Inf driver files are stored here, although will need
to be installed in order to update your Mouse driver).
If an updated driver is found, install it, then reboot
for the changes to take effect.
If you are using Windows
9x/Me select Device Manager. Open Mouse then
select your mouse & hit the Properties button.
Select the Driver tab.
Click the Update
Driver button & run through the Update driver
wizard. Select the C:\Windows\INF folder (substitute
drive letter & Windows folder as necessary) as the
location to search (Inf driver files are stored here,
although will need to be installed in order to update your
mouse driver). If an updated driver is found, install it,
then reboot for the changes to take effect.
|
