Mice with no balls.

[Isaac]

I use the labs at school and they all seem to have mice that don't work right. They're regular MS laser usb mice that cause the arrow to move after you've stopped moving the mouse, jump very far and fast if you move a little bit, or move... while you're holding the mouse still. These things will happen once every five minutes and it drives me crazy. I used to have this problem at home but i bought a sweet logitech mouse that looks alot like sapphire wolf's avatar, and i've never had the problem again. What's wrong with these other mice?

[Grendel]

Dust in the optical pickup or a bad mouse pad.

[Vindicator]

Or just a low-quality optical mouse.

[Krom]

The Microsoft Intellimouse I had seemed nice at the time... Then I got a Logitech MX510, only then did I figure out what a horrible mouse the Intellimouse optical was.

I now use a MX1000 and a G7.

[N2Flames]

logitech makes good stuff. I have a logitech surround speaker system, it blows away the 3-pc Polk Audio system I had. As for the problems with the mice, I have this issue at work from time to time (I run a waterjet machine - like on American Chopper). Garnet (sand from the waterjet stream) gets everywhere, even in the bottom of the mouse where the optic sensor is. I get the exact same problems you described until I clean the heck out of it.

[roid]

Dust in the optical pickup or a bad mouse pad.

nod

my mouse spazs out every few weeks, i pick it up and sure enough there's ALWAYS a hair on the lens.

so... shave your mouse.

[Isaac]

What's the fun in shaving a mouse with no balls?

[Sapphire Wolf]

I dunno, some shaving cream?
I'm useless T_T

[roid]

the dbb.com knows: shaving balls is risky business

[Duper]

Dust in the optical pickup or a bad mouse pad.

nod

my mouse spazs out every few weeks, i pick it up and sure enough there's ALWAYS a hair on the lens.

so... shave your mouse.

Or your CAT! I'm forever picking cat hair out of my mouse.

..er.. that didn't sound right..

[Foil]

Dust in the optical pickup or a bad mouse pad.

That, or the surface the mouse is being used on has a fine-grained pattern or texture. With any optical mouse, that pattern interferes with its operation.

For example, my computer desk has a "wood-grain" surface, so depending on where the mouse is, and whether I move it in a direction that goes along a grain, it jumps and stutters around.

[pATCheS]

Most optical mice \"power down\" after a few seconds of not moving in the interest of reducing power consumption. Having the LED full-on and the CCD sampling at maximum speed takes quite a bit of power, 30ma or more depending on the mouse. The downside to this of course is, when using the mouse on a fine-grained surface, it won't always be able to track the motion properly, so its motion analysis will be horribly wrong and your cursor will go flying. This happens more with cheaper mice that have a smaller viewing area and/or lower standby sampling rate. The standby sampling rate is actually low enough on most mice that you can see the flickering if you hold the mouse upside down and shake it or look at various points around the mouse.

The high-end mice from Logitech don't go into standby; these people are making mice for the gamers in this world. I have a G5 and I absolutely love it. If you have a camera of any sort, you can lift up the mouse and look at the area under the mouse with the camera and see the laser dot.

[DCrazy]

My brother went out and bought a Logitect MX1000 Laser Mouse, with on-the-fly adjustible resolution. I hate using it in Windows (I keep accidentally changing the DPI), but it's a dream in CounterStrike.