12 Aug
2006
12 Aug
'06
11:18 a.m.
Teo Zenios wrote:
I have a Mouse Systems M4 model optical mouse that
came with my Amiga 3000 but does not have the special mousepad needed for it, any way to
fake one of those pads?
The only other available mouse I have is for the A1000 and has an angled connector that
won't fit unless I jack the A3000 case up a few inches.
How well did the M4s work anyway? I did plug it in to my machine and the buttons seem to
work but I could not find a printed patterrn that would make the cursor do anything but
barely move (The red LED does light up). I tend to like optical mice so this would be cool
to have functioning.
I've managed to create passable optical mouse pads using aluminum foil
under a transparency that had grid lines printed on it from an ink-jet
printer. Face the ink side on the transparency down to avoid smudging
and don't crinkle the aluminum foil.
It works well on my Mouse Systems optical mice from the mid 80s. The
only problem I had was getting the grid spacing and the width of the
lines correct. You want to 'break' the light, but too thick of a line
is too much of a break. Also the spacing determines the resolution of
the mouse. Wide spacing is great for control, but you wind up picking
the mouse up and re-centering it quite a bit.
Mike