By Stephen Enggass (Enggass) (206.26.225.35) on Thursday, January 30, 2003 - 03:12 pm:

I have a Wacom Graphire tablet - the first version - and am having no luck with LW6.5b/OSX.1.5 recognizing any buttons other than the left one. The middle(scroll wheel) and Right buttons do absolutley nothing. I have downloaded the latest Driver from Wacom, but still no luck. Other programs do recognize these buttons. Any ideas? Anyone else? Worse case, I'll go get another 2-3 button mouse. Any siggestions? Anyone try the Kensington Studio Mouse?
Thanks all...
Steve

By Greg Reyna (Greg_Reyna) (68.164.55.228) on Saturday, February 01, 2003 - 01:54 pm:

That's strange. Is it a "Graphire 2"? Last Year, actually it was December of 2001, I got the Graphire 2 and its mouse worked great with the then-current version of Lightwave. I'm running an 800MHz dp G4, and at the time I was running the current version of OS X. The Wacom mouse was the only multi-button mouse that had OS X drivers then, so I was very happy to find it. I'm pretty sure I ran the drivers from the CD that came with the 8-inch tablet. I can send them to you if you wish, and if you have a fast connection---it totals about 10MB.

As far as current multi-button mice, in my opinion the best by far is Microsoft's Intellimouse Explorer 3.0 (USB and PS/2 compatible). It's a "laser mouse", so there are no wheels to get gummed-up. It has 5 buttons: two on the top with a wheel in the middle, and two on the top of the left side. I have it set so the Right button is Command-Click, and the Wheel is Option-Click. I don't use the side buttons; it works perfectly and never needs maintenance. The PC and Mac versions are the same, only the drivers are different so usually it's not in the Mac section of the store. Look for it any place that sells PC stuff.

Greg

By Ted Lee (Tedlee) (66.156.14.17) on Saturday, February 01, 2003 - 03:58 pm:

Kensington, IMHO, make the best Mac compatible mice. The MS mice are nice (I have two of the original Intellimouse Explorers), but I believe the Kensington mice to be nicer. I especially dig the Optical Elite. It has a nice blue glow to it, and it has a good rubberized grip.

The other reason the Kensington mice are better for OS X is the driver. Kensington is constantly updating and improving their driver, while MS hasn't made any mods since it's initial release almost a year ago.

The Kensington driver is also written in Cocoa, while the MS driver is just a Carbon, MS branded port of USB Overdrive.

I also have a Graphire 2 tablet and mouse, and have no problem using them under 10.2 with LW. I believe that the newest Wacom drivers require 10.2 (not entirely sure though). That might be the reason they aren't fully working for you.

By Greg Reyna (Greg_Reyna) (68.164.49.70) on Sunday, February 02, 2003 - 01:34 am:

There have been at least three updates to the Microsoft mouse since the first OS X version, but far be it from me to be a Microsoft "booster". Lucky for us there are choices now. Stardust or chocolate milk, buy whatever's cheaper!

Greg

By Beam Tracer (Beamtracer) (203.109.241.109) on Sunday, February 02, 2003 - 08:20 pm:

I'm still waiting for the Bluetooth mouse.

There are other wirelesss mice around (such as Logitech), however each package must come with a dedicated transmitter and a receiver (the mouse).

Why not install a Bluetooth transmitter? Then this one transmitter can service the mouse as well as other Bluetooth devices you might have acquired.

The only problem with this idea is that (as far as I know) the Bluetooth mouse has not been invented yet. After I get a Bluetooth mouse, then I'll be looking for a Bluetooth printer!