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Apple Preparing Two Button Mouse?

By Ed Oswald, BetaNews

March 16, 2005, 11:22 AM

Apple enthusiast sites are reporting that reliable sources say Apple is developing its first two button mouse, but no specific release date is known. AppleInsider said a change of heart within the company, as well as the push in recent months to regain market share from Windows has made such a move necessary.

Macintosh users have been asking for an Apple-manufactured two button mouse for several years, however the company has so far ignored those requests. According to sources, the mouse, which will be optical and wireless, would likely run approximately $69.

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By spiffyjeff

edited Mar 17, 2005 - 3:41 AM

If you want a 2 button mouse, go buy one, what would make apple's $60 mouse better?

here's a suggestion:
http://www.newegg.com/ap...n=26-119-105&depa=0

## i know it's been said before, but again, just because apple doesn't come with 2 button mouse doesn't mean they are not supported. I plugged one in and the right click menu works just fine. ##

Score: 0

By sjc001

posted Mar 17, 2005 - 7:13 AM

My MS Trackball Explorer has 4 buttons and a scroll wheel and the scroll wheel is a button as well. I love it. :)

Score: 0

By spiffyjeff

posted Mar 18, 2005 - 4:50 AM

i was refraining from saying MS

Score: 0

By carmad

posted Mar 17, 2005 - 12:43 AM

One of the main things people pick on Apple for, other than being overpriced, is the one button mouse. Having an official Apple 2 button mouse will make some of the PC users looking at Apple feel more comfortable, and should increase sales. Ipod is drawing people in and getting them to consider Apple, the Mac Mini is giving people a fairly economical option, and if you give them a two button mouse so everyone doesn't laugh at them as much, it can only help.

Score: 0

By GeorgeSantayana

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 9:52 PM

This is part of Apple's new collaboration with Simian. They have a whole slew of monkey coders whose tail functionality is completely going to waste on one-button mice.

Score: 0

By bastet

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 2:07 PM

[sarcasm]
Oh my God, who's leaking this trade secret? Man, I'd hate to be the guy who leaked this very, very sensitive information. The finacial damages must be in the hundreds of millions, LOL ;-)
[/sarcasm]

Score: 0

By BklynKid

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 2:06 PM

Perhaps Macs can now be considered for serious work. I never understood how people use those slow, lagged, 1-button mice with Macs and then press Ctrl everytime they want more options.

Anyway, f Apple!

Score: 0

By RobertM

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 8:36 PM

Or ... they could simply use a two-, three- or more-button mouse of their choice, since OS X works fine with whatever you choose, without extra drivers (well, *maybe* for those superduperultrauber 200-button mice, but three button mice, probably even five-button mice...they're good to go out of the box).

You never *need* multibutton mice on Macs because interfaces are designed in such a way that that is never the only way to access things (except in some program that I forget the name of, but any good or typical use does not), but nothing's stopping you from using one. It's just now rumored that Apple may be making their own.

Score: 0

By guitarguynboston

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 1:48 PM

Only $69 dollars for a real mouse. Why not by a microsoft one for $20 instead and get a scroll on top of it.

Score: 0

By Neoprimal

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 6:02 PM

Well...come now...if any apple user will buy an underpowered piece of computing hardware for 2-3 grand, always at LEAST a grand over it's Windows/Linux running counterpart of better value and build; and will buy any piece of hardware for it for exorbitant prices....then why in jeebus' name wouldn't they buy a $69 apple made mouse?

Score: 0

By alexweber15

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 12:40 PM

what's next a scrolling wheel?

Score: 0

By sjc001

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 11:53 AM

Welcome to the 21st century Apple. :)

Score: 0

By Choda_Boy

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 11:10 PM

Don't you mean 20th Century?

:-P

Score: 0

By PC Rat

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 11:43 AM

Contrary to revisionist history, it was PC's ...not Mac's... which were first to have a mouse, first to have two-button mice, etc.

~Both~ Microsoft and Apple stole the GUI, mouse navigation, et. al. from PARC.

Microsoft just did more with it.

The Computer Rodent

Score: 0

By Squire72

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 1:23 PM

Stole the GUI?

Apple was given the GUI and mouse by Xerox, which they altered, fiddled with, and customized and it eventually became the MacOS. Xerox, oddly enough, didn't see a use for these things.

The DOS based PC has been able to use a mouse for a long time, but it didn't get GUI until after Bill Gates was given a prototype of the Mac PC by Apple, and decided to make his own version.

PC = Personal Computer. The Mac is as much a PC as anything Windows or Linux based... I suppose the only reason PC is used is because the PC market is so fragmented, and calling them "IBM PCs" isn't accurate anymore.

Score: 0

By PC Rat

posted Mar 17, 2005 - 9:25 AM

"Apple was given the GUI and mouse by Xerox"

In the same way Microsoft was !

Steve Jobs toured PARC about a year before Bill Gates did.

Only real difference being that Jobs tried to run a GUI on under-powered personal computers of the day, while Gates had the good sense to wait until PC's became powerful enough to operate a GUI on.

The DataRat

Score: 0

By M1M2Z1

edited Mar 16, 2005 - 12:34 PM

Macs are PCs, you silly dehomag!

Score: 0

By Tenoq

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 9:57 PM

Wow - the immature and unfounded anti-Mac sentiment is alive and well in the CS/script-kiddie community. Even your average mature joe these days can recognise the many advantages of owning a Mac.

I know I'd own one, just like I'd run Linux full-time... if not for the games! They keep dragging me back to that much-hated, but unfortunately widely-used Windows. Games are still the last-frontier for compatibility issues, I guess.

Score: 0

By M1M2Z1

posted Mar 16, 2005 - 10:28 PM

Games bro?
What the f#c@k!

Everything you need is (out) there.

You're just not used to buying things without money.

Once you actually join the community, you'll see the difference.

Have you ever heard of NeXT?
Tim Berners-Lee has.

Score: 0

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