Apple’s own wireless trackpad and wireless keyboards work while being plugged in.
I think the sleek visual and ergonomic design specifically resulted in the charge port being put on the bottom, which resulted in their decision to disable the mouse when it’s charging. Not the other way around.
Given that the Magic Keyboard can be used while plugged in, and the Magic Mouse (clearly) can't, this should be read as a design decision, rather than simply lazy placement.
My guess is that in testing, they found quite a few users were keeping their KB/Mouse plugged in and charging all the time.
The Keyboard remains relatively stationary, whereas the mouse moves around quite a bit..
Given how frayed iPhone Lightning cables become when you move them, Apple probably (rightfully) worried that using the mouse while plugged-in would lead to damaged cables and a bad experience.
Moving the charging to the bottom stops this behavior.
People will charge their mouse, then use it wirelessly..
While I think a better solution may have been to re-engineer the lightning cables to be more resilient, this doesn't seem insane.
They're trying to use design to encourage certain user behavior, while discouraging others that don't work well.
If I recall the mouse decision was deliberate to avoid people having the mouse plugged in all the time. So it was more of a planned user experience rather than apple not knowing what they're doing (for better or worse). Besides the mouse charges in like 5 minutes anyway.
Is that not by design? Apple doesn't want the user to plug in the mouse to charge, forget to unplug it, and use it like a wired mouse. They therefore force the user through its design to literally be unable to use it that way. In my view that's good design, as it follows the goals of the designer. If one contends that design should follow the goals of the user, well, there are always other mice one can use.
I think that's the exact scenario they tried to avoid. The lightning cable is actually pretty stiff, it won't take long for it to break if one could use it pluged in like a wired mouse.
I dislike most things Apple has done recently. But I can understand this one.
It's fine for the trackpad, designed and released together with the mouse, to have the lightning port on the back and be used plugged in, because it doesn't move so there shouldn't be much stress on the cable.
The Magic Mouse charge port is deliberate. Apple knows that people would leave the cable connected if it were placed at the edge. that would undermine the wireless aesthetic.
i think i recall reading somewhere that apple designed the mouse in the way they did in order to prevent people just leaving the mouse on charge 24/7 and hence not using its wireless capability while negatively affecting the battery.
i’m not saying i agree with apple’s decision, but i find the perspective interesting.
Not that I necessarily agree, but I've heard that Apple intentionally designed it that way because they didn't want users to plug the cord in all the time and effectively make it a wired mouse. They wanted users to actually use the mouse wirelessly as intended.
That certainly seems like a more logical explanation than literally no one at Apple anticipating such an obvious design consequence for a major accessory.
I feel like this is on purpose. How could it be a mistake, Apple has legendary design sense? I think it's to discourage people from using the mouse while its charging, and thus undermining what distinguishes the product. Regardless of the truth, I find it to be unfriendly to the consumer.
And yet they let you use the Magic Trackpad and keyboard while plugged in just fine. IIRC they even run wired if plugged in too. I think they just wanted to recycle the chassis of the original Magic Mouse to save on tooling and parts but that design doesn't allow for a plug in the front so they came up with this turd of a design.
This evidence supports the form over function argument: one can only conclude Apple sassily put the charge port on the bottom to make it impossible even to think of using the mouse while a cord is attached.
> Similar to the goofy way you must insert Apple's Pencil into the bottom of the iPad Pro, Apple asks Magic Mouse 2 users to flip the device on its back like a beetle with its legs in the air and plug in the cable. You cannot use the mouse this way, naturally, and it seems a strange choice considering wired mice have had cables running from their front ends for decades.
I'm sure that this is deliberate. Apple does not want you to use the mouse while it is charging. If the charging cable attached to the top like a wired mouse, then Apple would have to make the cable and port more rugged and do lots of testing to make sure that constant plugged-in use didn't break it. You only have to charge it a few minutes a day, or overnight once a month, so it's not a real inconvenience.
If you want to use the mouse while plugged in, just go buy a wired mouse.
I saw an article where someone rigged the magic mouse so that the cord was not on the bottom. They found that the mouse was unable to be used while charging. So putting the charge port on the bottom may have been driven by larger design decisions that made use while charging not possible.
For what it's worth, I don't think Steve Jobs would have ever allowed the charging port for the Magic Mouse to ever be on the bottom and forced the user to have to leave the mouse on it's side to charge.
I have to wonder if that design came about because Apple didn’t want people to leave the mouse plugged in all the time. It’s the kind of reasoned institutional blunder that I feel like I encounter in my work life fairly often out of momentum and groupthink.
Steve might have actually loved it if he'd see it. It is rumoured that Apple put the charging port in such an awkward place to force people to unplug the cable as soon as the mouse is charged.
I can imagine customers using the wireless mouse with the cable attached is something that would grind Steve's gears as well. Preventing the situation with a flipped tortoise design is a Steve thing to do.
Sure, but it doesn't say anything about it not working while being plugged in. That seems more of a "wired mouse when it's plugged in, wireless mouse when it's not" kinda thing.
Edit: Looking at the pics on the Apple site for it, it plugs in on the bottom. You wouldn't be able to use it even if you wanted to.
The Magic Mouse 2 charging situation is entirely by design. I'm totally serious.
Apple stated they don't want people to leave the mouse plugged in forever, hence having an unnecessary wire, so the design ended up the way it is to force wireless use.
I don't really mind, can see that point I guess. I like the MM2 to be perfectly frank, but I recognise that I'm a minority.
I think the sleek visual and ergonomic design specifically resulted in the charge port being put on the bottom, which resulted in their decision to disable the mouse when it’s charging. Not the other way around.
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