Optical Mouse - Power

Power

Manufacturers often engineer their optical mice—especially battery-powered wireless models—to save power when possible. To do this, the mouse dims or blinks the laser or LED when in standby mode (each mouse has a different standby time). A typical implementation (by Logitech) has four power states, where the sensor is pulsed at different rates per second:

• 11500: full on, for accurate response while moving, illumination appears bright.
• 1100: fallback active condition while not moving, illumination appears dull.
• 110: standby
• 12: sleep state

Movement can be detected in any of these states; some mice turn the sensor fully off in the sleep state, requiring a button click to wake.

Optical mice utilizing infrared elements (LEDs or lasers) offer substantial increases in battery life. Some mice, such as the Logitech V450 848 nm laser mouse, are capable of functioning on two AA batteries for a full year, due to the low power requirements of the infrared laser.

Mice designed for use where low latency and high responsiveness are important, such as in playing video games, may omit power-saving features to improve performance.