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Microsoft Breeds Smarter Mouse

Upcoming $75 IntelliMouse Explorer features ergonomic design and no moving parts.

By Stan Miastkowski, PCWorld   

The IntelliMouse Explorer, which will be available in September for $74.95, has a new refined "natural posture" shape that Microsoft claims will support the entire hand while positioning both the hand and forearm in a natural resting posture.

And it doesn't look boring, either, with an industrial-silver finish, a glowing red undercarriage, and (believe it or not) a red taillight.

But what sets the IntelliMouse Explorer apart from prior incarnations of Microsoft rodents is that it's the company's first all-optical mouse. There's no mouse ball or moving parts. Instead, an optical sensor, working along with a built-in digital signal processing chip and using a red LED light source, tracks movement and sends cursor commands to the PC.

Lights, Camera, Mouse Movement

Microsoft claims that the technology will work accurately on virtually any surface--no mouse pad is needed.

The company also says the IntelliMouse Explorer provides an unusually high degree of precision. Using a technology dubbed image correlation processing, the mouse's optical sensor captures 1500 "digital snapshots" per second of the surface that the mouse is on, working with the DSP chip, which executes 18 million instructions per second.

Microsoft says the current generation of ball-based mice only executes about 1.5 million operations per second, making the IntelliMouse Explorer "12 time smarter than an ordinary mouse."

Optical mouse technology isn't a new concept; Mouse System patented and introduced the first optical mouse with no moving parts in 1982. The company also developed the scrolling mouse wheel in 1994, which Microsoft licensed in 1998 for its first IntelliMouse. Mouse Systems still sells optical mice, but they differ from Microsoft's new design because they require a special mouse pad with a high-resolution grid pattern.

Mouse, Get With the Program

The IntelliMouse Explorer has a scrolling wheel like prior versions, but also sports two new function buttons on its left side. The buttons come are programmed for Forward and Back Web page movement within Internet Explorer, but can be customized for virtually any function using the included IntelliMouse software.

The new mouse hooks up to a PS/2 mouse port or USB port. No serial port version will be available. It works with Windows 95, 98, and NT.

Microsoft will continue to offer the original IntelliMouse, which features a standard mouse ball, for $54.95.