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zaunkoenig m1k: 23g mouse (pure fingertip grip)

51K views 189 replies 43 participants last post by  IPS.Blue 
#1 · (Edited)
edit: live @ https://www.kickstarter.com/project...ig-m1k-worlds-first-carbon-fiber-gaming-mouse

oh, and without stupid holes all over the shell :thumb:

disclaimers:
1. i have had email correspondence with the few people involved in this for a few years
2. i have received 2 prototypes for free
3. the firmware is based off mine (and so is that of the ninox astrum...)

anyway, website:
https://zaunkoenig.co/

notes:
this apparently wasn't obvious, so i edited the title, but it is intended to be a pure fingertip grip mouse
3360 sensor
buttons debounce using latch method (or whatever it's called), so no delay on press or release
usb works up to 8000hz polling if you use the oc'd driver, otherwise 1000hz
no wheel (hopefully there will be in their future mice)
extremely short design intended for pure fingertip grips
best cable i've used on a mouse (https://www.digikey.com/product-detail/en/tensility-international-corp/30-00446/T1311-1-ND/5819495).
1 piece carbon fiber top shell

pics of the prototype i received:
 

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#3 ·
Set/release latch method would be the correct name as it refers to the transistor logic behind a flipflop circuit. the other terms are vague to the engineer, but more descriptive to the common mouser. It is a polished design, and looks like it has the potential to be popular among simpler fps games.
 
#6 ·
That is something.
 
#7 ·
Neat. Though I think the carbon fiber is almost as bad a gimmick as a bunch of holes drilled in it. Yes, you get extra rigidity, but plastic is less dense than carbon fiber, and already strong enough. With carbon fiber you can make the shell thinner, but until you actually do so there isn't any weight savings.
 
#10 ·
they did make the shell very thin, around 0.8mm or something

carbon fiber is denser but as i understand should be stiffer for the same weight. whether the uniform carbon fiber shell is stronger or a plain abs shell (with reinforcements inside) of the same weight is the real question, and i'd bet on carbon

i stand by my opinion that holes are dumb 😄
 
#12 ·
Take a PCB, add glides to bottom of it, put on a few switches with "levers" (a type of switch, OMRON, etc.) so you don't need extra shell for buttons or just make small finger sized buttons over the switch, add small finger sized hold point on both sides, done. No need for fancy shells :p Finger hold and glide around the PCB really.
 
#13 · (Edited)
I want to get one of these in my hands so badly. For years I've obsessively analyzed physiology / pushing the boundaries of aiming. Reading their blog, it seems Patrick and Dominik have come to many of the same conclusions I have. Will be following this closely and would be very interested in a discussion with these guys.
 
#15 ·
This is a promising start, but just two buttons and no wheel means offloading too many commands to the left hand in games, and having to switch to another mouse for non-gaming tasks.

Wheels are heavy, so the best path might be to add more buttons. Subdividing the top shell into 4 buttons would allow you to have both a dedicated MMB and, for those cases where MMB is bound to something, a scroll-mode button that sends wheel-up and wheel-down messages based on mouse movement (you see this on laptops sometimes, though it usually replaces MMB, which is non-ideal). Another possibility for adding buttons would be to put a thin squishy layer over the carbon sides with a set of membranes in between; this *would* add a bit of weight, but would also make the mouse more comfortable to use, and address concerns about potentially having to hold the mouse too tightly to deal with the smooth carbon surface. I used to own an R2 Omnimouse, with no wheel but four top buttons and three side membrane hotspots (on the right side, which makes sense: for fingertip grip, the mechanical grip you get from your thumb is too important to move it to press a button, so any buttons on that side would only be suitable for very low frequency commands), and, once I'd programmed it with a decent set of gestures, never found myself wishing it had a wheel.

Also: +1 for "holes are stupid". There's no way having the PCB be that exposed can be good for longevity!
 
#17 ·
Capacitive "hidden" scroll wheel and MMB switch. Swipe the surface to scroll how far you want, tap to click. Maybe some mice have this already, like those crazy Apple etc. who knows, you don't get steps but who cares when you can program it so that in games 1 swipe no matter how long over a threshold = 1 step. More so games often ignore number of steps anyway and filter the user input heavily unfortunately.
 
#26 ·
hacked usb driver of course
i think there's some old post about this but to get 2000 or above polling without messing with drivers requires hi-speed usb which is a lot more work
 
#28 · (Edited)
They talk about zero grams mouse, which is doable but good luck with accuracy as such thing would be tracking your hand, such as camera, etc. Such as VR has tracking.

Do they plan an asymmetric design which reflects the fact that middle and ring finger are longest (at least on male hands). That's where I always run out of mouse size, middle and ring finger. Some mice have that side longer but not many.
2 button mouse is fairly specific use case though, say strategy games StarCraft, ..., but not FPS games at least not for me where I do want 2 side buttons a scroll wheel with a button and I could always use more if it was well placed and usable but that's hard to do and makes little sense on a tiny mouse.

How long is the mouse?
The smallest I could hold is around 8cm length and for comfort 6+cm wide. With usable side buttons likely at least 9cm long.

Tried it with my 9.5-10cm long 5cm wide mouse, 50g.
 
#29 ·
i'm fairly sure they'll stick with a symmetric design for their first mouse. i doubt that the final design will look much different from the prototype

dont have ruler to measure length but you can judge from the pic comparison to g pro. but it's very short of course. the point is that in a (pure) fingertip grip, the parts near the palm aren't in contact and hence only contribute unnecessary weight, so why not just chop that part off?
 
#33 ·
Good estimates. Grip length is about 65 mm, total length is 79 mm, width is 54 mm at the back and 60 mm at the front. Height is 30 mm.
qsxcv already showed a picture of him gripping the mouse with a Fingertip Grip. To drive this point home really hard: it is impossible to use Claw Grip or Palm Grip for this mouse. The mouse is way too short for that. The second you optimize a pure Fingertip Grip mouse towards Claw Grip or Palm Grip, the mouse will not be optimal for Fingertip Grip anymore, because it now would be too long. As qsxcv already said: the biggest advantage of designing for Fingertip Grip only is that you can make a much shorter mouse, as you dont have to offer support for the palm. This is why Fingertip Grip mice will always have a weight advantage over mice optimized for Claw Grip or Palm Grip.
 
#32 ·
They could round the bottom edge and corners a bit more. Doesn't have to be as aggressive rounding as G403 but at least a little like IE3.0 is rounded. Otherwise it may love to scratch when not at perfect flat angle to surface. Otherwise it looks fine when your hand is small enough to grip it.
 
#34 ·
They were some threads about palm vs claw some years ago. But you can create theory about everything: "fingertip is better than palm" but at least try to prove it. Maybe make some study. Don't want to go too offtop, but saying that holding mouse is same as holding pencil is wrong, because in game you can change sensititvity but in real life you can't.
 
#42 · (Edited)
Well, most ABS mice are in no way optimized for weight. Even the ones with a bunch of holes aren't using the right pattern to maximize rigidity, the honeycomb shape only really works when it's backed by a sheet to keep the hexagons hexagon shaped. If you're using a space frame you should be using triangular holes.

It's extremely relevant how the sides are flexing,

is the top wiggling side to side with respect to the bottom, like a parallelogram?
Are the sides bending inward when gripped? If the latter, are they bending inward at the bottom or in the middle?

Making the sides thicker would only really make sense in that last case. In the first case I'd try a narrow reinforcing strip from the left side, along the top(right behind the buttons) to the right side. If it's bending in at the bottom, you need to better transfer the forces to the bottom plate.
 
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