A small but persistent annoyance in writing on my Mac mini is the way the mouse cursor behaves. Or in this case, misbehaves.
I noticed it when I connected my Logitech Marathon 705 via USB wireless receiver. Mouse movement would seem okay, but on closer inspection there is always some glitches in the form of the cursor jumping ahead or stuttering. I installed the Logitech drivers and found no change.
I then switched to a Logitech M720, which connects via the same receiver. The erratic mouse movement was even worse. I tried using both mice directly on my desktop, no mousepad. No improvement. I tried various things like software updates, restarting in safe mode and so on and again, no change. Jiggly mouse syndrome persisted. I did not want jiggly mice.
Searching for troubleshooting tips largely produced results that were obvious and unhelpful (“check to see if there is gunk in your mouse”) or obscure enough to make me wonder if Macs are just really bad with third party mice.
Since both tested mice are wireless and using the same receiver, I decided to try a different approach. I unplugged the receiver and plugged in my old wired Steelseries Rival 300 mouse. When I used this mouse with Windows, I quite liked it and only replaced it when I went wireless (with the Logitech G700, which I adore, save for somewhat short battery life). After plugging in the Rival 300 I waited a few moments, then moved the mouse. It moved exactly as intended. No jumps, no jiggles, no erratic behavior. It was super slow, as is always the case with the default mouse settings on a Mac (why this is so is a question left for the ages). I bumped up the tracking speed and voila, it is working just fine.
So now I wonder, is it the wireless receiver? Is it a Logitech thing? Would this happen with a Bluetooth mouse? I am okay with using the Rival 300 as a stopgap but given the Mac mini and PC share the same desk, I really prefer wireless for both. I’ll probably try digging out my old Microsoft Bluetooth mouse and see how it fares, as soon as I remember where it is. In the meantime, I accept a tail on a mouse to end the mouse mayhem on my Mac.
Also, to paraphrase Phil Schiller, as others have done a billion times or so already, “It just works, my butt.”
