Wireless and batteryless mice, courtesy Magic Magnetism

I love the idea of tailless—er, wireless mice. Cords can get in the way at times; in my house, the tangle of cables behind my desk sometimes causes my mouse to get pulled back, as though being sucked into some sort of cosmic black hole. Wireless mice have much more freedom, but they’re tethered in other ways. Battery consumption, for example.

A4Tech’s come up with a nifty solution to that problem: don’t wire the mouse; wire the mousepad . The dedicated mousepad plugs into your computer’s USB port and provides power to the mouse via electromagnetic induction. There are downsides to this, of course. For one thing, those looking to use their computer while several feet away will still be limited by the length of the mousepad’s cord. Also, I’d imagine that the induction will only work as long as the mouse is in contact with the pad. But on the flipside, you’ll never have to worry about running out of batteries.

Besides its novel power concept, the mouse features the usual niceties: scroll wheel, 800dpi tracking, and seven programmable buttons (Windows may be necessary to program the buttons, but since it’s a standard USB connection, it ought to work fine). It’ll run 20,000 Korean Wan, or around $21.

[via Engadget ]