Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Mighty Mouse scroll problem...

My first mighty mouse went badly wrong and they replaced it in 10 minutes at the genius bar.

My new one started showing problems, but all you have to do is run a damp cloth over the ball as soon as symptoms show! If you leave it, the problem will get worse and un-cleanable!
 
JOY!!! The upsidedown rolling on paper trick did it for me!!!! I CAN SCROLL AGAIN!!!! :D
 
amacgenius said:
Recently my Mighty Mouse has had a tendency to only scroll up, the ball will move down but the page or website, etc I'm in won't scroll down, I've tried restarting, unplugging and plugging in, nothing. Anybody have any idea what's wrong?

Thanks.
Click to expand...

My Mighty Mouse is doing the same thing and it's driving me nuts.....
 
It looks to be a very common problem (no I'm not suggesting a class action lawsuit). I've had mine for about a month, and just noticed the same thing (scroll up, but not down). Interestingly, I did nothing to the ball, but instead, after trying another mouse to confirm it was the mouse) just un-plugged it and plugged it back in. The posts here all seem to suggest dust/gunk, but it seems odd that so many seem to be affected in only one direction.

Mark
 
I took the long road and took it apart. its was tricky. the scroll wheel is not optical as someone had said. there are 4 tiny bars that it rolls against (one for each direction)

deffinately not a good idea for someone with no patience or big fingers.
 
snack said:
Cleaning method that worked for me:

Turn the mouse upside down and roll the ball around on a bit of white paper.

You'll see the crap rub off and it will scroll again.
Click to expand...

:eek: amazing! it really works! thank you so much.:)
 
At the risk of sounding like a whiner, the (so-called) "Mighty" mouse is the only Apple product I've owned that sucked. The ball, which is too small, gums up all the time and is not easy clean. Rolling the ball on a damp cloth while the mouse is inverted generally works, but it seems to be getting harder to clean and I grow weary of the waste of time... Also, it does not track as well on my desktop as my $10 Logitech mouse. I have put aside the M.M. and gone back to the Logitech. Frankly, I'm suprised Apple hasn't improved the design.
 
..in a white submarine

Cleaning the roller bal from the outside didn't work for me at all and cranking the mouse open was my last resort. So I preferred to completely immerse the mouse (of course while it is not connected) in distilled water and roll the ball a few times in the water. Then I left it in a warm place to dry completely for 2 days. It now works like a charm. If you are prepared to take the risk (this procedure may damage the mouse in very rare cases, distilled water does not conduct electricity and in theory it leaves no traces behind when it completely dries) this procedure is much easier than taking the mouse apart and may be much more safe. CAUTION: 1) the basin or bowl you use must be very clean, the water distilled AND you must allow for the mouse to dry COMPLETELY before plugging it in back.
 
There have been a ton of threads about how the Mighty mouse is bunk.

Including a thread I started a month or two ago called "the mighty mouse can kiss my as#" I was distraught...

At first it didn't scroll down...then it started working fine again....then it stopped scrolling up.....then it started working fine again...now it stopped scrolling down again...

I said I was going to toss the thing off my balcony in a similar thread a few weeks ago, but I'll try the trouble shooting techinques posted above,

stupid question...is distilled water just boiled water?...

either way, maybe drowning it will be a better alternative than tossing it off the balcony...

what a waste of money .......
 
No, you can't make distilled water by yourself, at least not easily. It is purified water without calcs and so on. It is used for electrical irons and car batteries and it is sold in supermarkets (It costs about $1 per gallon/1€ per 5 litres in my country)
 
So,

I tried the above ideas, with no luck.

But, I found that by turnin off the third button, so that i can press down hard on the scroll ball without opening the application switcher, I can get it to scroll down with some effort.

I really have to dig down into the ball to get it to go down, but at least it works now.
 
fixed

I had the same no down scroll issue, did the upside down, roll hard on paper, and all good now, thanks
 
Better With Alcohol

I had the same scroll problem today. My MightyMouse stopped scrolling down. I've tried to clean the ball with a damp cloth but no luck. So I decided to clean it with alcohol (well substitute it with after-shave since I didn't have alcohol). It finally worked after spending some time. It smells good too!:)
 
Alcohol Works Wonders

I'm not sure about the long term affects of using alcohol, but I just tried it out and it works as good as new now.
 
BlueT said:
I'm not sure about the long term affects of using alcohol, but I just tried it out and it works as good as new now.
Click to expand...

Well, alcohol would be a great option. If you drink enough, you would think that the scroll ball was working. :) The long term affects of using alcohol may include the loss of brain cells and potential alcoholism....

But seriously, alcohol is commonly used to clean metal surfaces and electrical connections. Rubbing alcohol should completely evaporate and leave no trace...but I'm also not too sure if repeated use could damage the rubber wheels and ball.

As a side note, I also sometimes have the issue of not being able to scroll down. I just bang the MM upside down on my desk. Afterward, it works fine.
 
MM problem

I was just having the same problem and came here for the solution. I hit it with one of those aerosol cans for dusting your keyboard. (Well, I didn't hit it, I sprayed it.) Seems fine now, but I guess it's a common problem. I bet it's on the drawing board to be updated soon.
 
me and my roommates have a total of 4 mighty mice
3 have had this problem, the other one is brand new so has yet to exhibit this problem
we took them all to the genius bar, the genius pulled out an alcohol wipe similar to one you would find in a first aid kit. gave it a very hard rubbing.
went back to working
now two of them are back at it again. i repeated the alcohol method and they work fine again
its just a pain in the butt
 
mighty mouse and Mr Muscle glass cleaner

:)
this worked for me - small amount of mr muscle glass cleaner on a clean tissue - then rubbed the rubber ball with damp tissue up and down side to side - now scrolls fine again:apple:
 
Other Solution

I know that a lot of people are getting results with the cleaning method (I also had this kind of trouble early on) but lately my mouse wasn't scrolling down no matter how hard I scrubbed.
Then, my macbook started giving me all kinds of other trouble with slowdowns, so I doctored it a bit. In addition to debugging the rest of my issues, the disk utilities ended up fixing my scroll with no additional cleaning, so if you're in a bind, give that a try.
 
Apple really missed the boat on this one. Its a great concept, but it is very poorly executed. The wire makes all kinds of noise as it slides across my wooden desk, and it leaves a fine white powder everywhere. I had to deactivate the two side buttons because I kept clicking them inadvertently... and even now that they are deactivated, they constantly make little clicking noises when I work. The scroll wheel can be fixed the first few times it jams, but eventually it WILL jam for good. Mine has been sitting around (broken) for months while I use a 5 year old Microsoft mouse that I purchased for $12.00... it works just fine. Yesterday I tried to get the Mighty Mouse up and running again... its now in pieces and I'm pretty ticked off to say the least. It broke apart like a cheap kids toy, and now I have to go after Apple for some form of compensation. Apple owes their high-end professional users better than this. If you doubt how cheesy this mouse is, just look at the number of pages dedicated to complaining about this sub-par product on this website. No mouse I'm aware of has ever been the subject of so much global dissatisfaction and disdain.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back