Optical mouse

The other type, invented by Richard F. Lyon of Xerox, used a 16-pixel visible-light image sensor with integrated motion detection on the same n‑type (5 μm) MOS integrated circuit chip,[6][7] and tracked the motion of light dots in a dark field of a printed paper or similar mouse pad.

[9] The Mouse Systems (Kirsch) design was commercialised and sold in PC compatible form by the company itself[10] alongside variants rebranded for OEM use with Sun Microsystems workstations[11] and by Data General.

[12] Modern surface-independent optical mice work by using an optoelectronic sensor (essentially, a tiny low-resolution video camera) to take successive images of the surface on which the mouse operates.

The amount that the edges of one photograph overhang the other represents the offset between the images, and in the case of an optical computer mouse the distance it has moved.

Mice usually embeds some kind of Image Acquisition System and DSP processors for fast data processing.

[citation needed] The development of the modern optical mouse at Hewlett-Packard Co. was supported by a succession of related projects during the 1990s at HP Laboratories.

In 1992 William Holland was awarded US Patent 5,089,712 and John Ertel, William Holland, Kent Vincent, Rueiming Jamp, and Richard Baldwin were awarded US Patent 5,149,980 for measuring linear paper advance in a printer by correlating images of paper fibers.

Ross R. Allen, David Beard, Mark T. Smith, and Barclay J. Tullis were awarded US Patents 5,578,813 (1996) and 5,644,139 (1997) for 2-dimensional optical navigational (i.e., position measurement) principles based on detecting and correlating microscopic, inherent features of the surface over which the navigation sensor travelled, and using position measurements of each end of a linear (document) image sensor to reconstruct an image of the document.

[17] However, laser mice did not enter the mainstream consumer market until 2004, following the development by a team at Agilent Laboratories, Palo Alto, led by Doug Baney of a laser-based mouse based on a 850 nm VCSEL that offered a 20X improvement in tracking performance.

Tong Xie, Marshall T. Depue, and Douglas M. Baney were awarded US patents 7,116,427 and 7,321,359 for their work on low power consumption broad navigability VCSEL-based consumer mice.

Optical mice utilizing infrared elements (LEDs or lasers) offer substantial increases in battery life over visible spectrum illumination.

[clarification needed] Mice designed for use where low latency and high responsiveness are important, such as in playing video games, may omit power-saving features and require a wired connection to improve performance.

However, they generally cannot track on glossy and transparent surfaces, including some mouse-pads, causing the cursor to drift unpredictably during operation.

Optical models outperform mechanical mice on uneven, slick, soft, sticky, or loose surfaces, and generally in mobile situations lacking mouse pads.

A Microsoft wireless optical mouse
An early Xerox optical mouse chip, before the development of the inverted packaging design of Williams and Cherry
OEM-branded Mouse Systems (Kirsch) optical mouse showing underside and mousemat pattern.
Microscope photograph of the IntelliMouse Explorer sensor silicon die
The optical sensor from a Microsoft Wireless IntelliMouse Explorer (v. 1.0A)
S5085 optical sensor IC die (CMOS sensor + driver)
The blue-LED-based V-Mouse VM-101
Although invisible to the naked eye, the light produced by this laser mouse is captured as the color purple because CCDs are sensitive to a broader light wavelength range than the human eye.
The Logitech iFeel optical mouse uses a red LED to project light onto the tracking surface.