Review of Ergonomic Evoluent VerticalMouse 3

JJJumper writes "CoolTechZone.com reviews Evoluent's VerticalMouse 3 mouse that's touted to be the world's most health conscious, ergonomics friendly mouse in the world. And it's vertical, too, instead of horizontal. The review states, "Unlike other mice, Evoluent's VerticalMouse 3 stands vertical to locate your hand in a handshake position, or where the arm is in 90-degrees form from the tabletop. It even has a small lip at the bottom to prevent your little finger from touching the desk. According to the company, this is the most natural position for the hand to be in and it reduces a magnitude of stress from your hand, wrist and arm. Apparently traditional mice with horizontal statures twist your lower arm and put unnecessary stress on its vital areas. We must admit that getting used to the mouse didn't take too long, even though it was slightly awkward to get used to in the beginning. After all, old habits die hard."

Perific

[richie2000]

The Evoluent looks good, but it's still only usable in one single position as far as I can tell from the write-up. Even though this is a better and more natural position than regular mice, I'd rather use a mouse that promotes changes in posture, like this one: http://www.perific.com/products/ [perific.com]

Re:Looks Nice

[stoolpigeon]

Being a lefty is just hard - The Human Solution [thehumansolution.com] has it for less. I am not familiar with them, their level of service, etc. but it looks like they've got the left handed versions for about $70.
 
I'm fortunate - I write and eat left handed but do just about everything else right handed.

Seat Position

[OctoberSky]

I, like many office workers, sit in an non-OSHA approved seating position while at work. My chair is at it's lowest height, leaned back as far as it will go, and my arm is not near a 90 degree angle. But I'm damn comfortable. My mouse is pointed at "11:00" because that's how my wrist like it. My brain is trained to understand that forward towards the monitor will lead the mouse pointer diaganol towards the top right of the screen. Moving the mouse diagonaly left/forward, moves the pointer vertically on the screen.

To compensate for the fact that I don't have a "natural" or "ergonomic" keyboard I have changed my finger position from the standard "asd fjkl;" line up to "cdsa nkl;" my fingers make the "ergonomic" shape.

They make these things for people who sit "properly" the only problem is that most people don't sit "properly"

Re:Useless

[louks]

IANA Ergonomics Expert, but from a computing standpoint, this is not the best idea for a mouse. With a standard mouse, finer motion control of the mouse is done with the fingertips and wrist, not the hand and arm. With a vertical mouse, you are controlling the cursor by moving the entire arm, including the shoulder. Sure, you eliminate finger arthritis pain, but muscles used for gross motor control are not optimal for pointing to the nearest pixel. I can forsee more shoulder problems and tennis elbow after long-term use of this device. They're just moving the repetitive motion onto a different ledger.

Re:Looks Nice

[0100010001010011]

Hurray for being a 'bastard' southpaw.

Left Handed:
Writing
Tennis
Soldering
Knives
Spoons

Right Handed:
Mice
Throwing
Kicking

Either:
Forks

The really weird exception to the rule is FPS... back in my FPS days I would always use my left hand. I think it's because I don't like moving my left hand as much as my left fingers, and FPS I only need minute control over the mouse as I do all movement with the keypad.

Who knows.

Re:This Mouse is not good it made my problem worse

[Half-pint HAL]

Scroll-wheels are bad for you. Full stop.

Basically, wherever it is, you have to lift your finger and bend it. Your fingers are only controlled by two main muscles -- one bends, one straightens. To lift your finger you need to use the "straighten" muscle (extensor), and to bend you're using the opposing muscle (flexor). this means you're fighting with yourself and putting more tension on the tendons.

People keep trying to fix problems by making more fancy mice, but in the end, a decent keyboard interface can remove the need for most mouse-work. (eg PgUp/PgDn for scrolling).

HAL.

Re:I just tested it!

[vux984]

Some doctors? It just seems like some doctor with a degree held one and said, "Yeah that feels a bit better." They made no mention of a medical reason to use one over any other mouse, they simply said, "It might feel a little better."

I completely agree with your post overall. However, you implied a question about why the vertical vs horizontal has a medical basis:

http://www.evoluent.com/vm3.html [evoluent.com]

The skeletal picture illustrates the idea fairly well.

Or stand up, and let your arms fall to your sides, the natural position is clearly the 'vertical' position, whith your palms against your upper leg/thigh. Now 'twist' them to the 'horizontal' position with the palms facing behind you. Most of us, at least, can feel the difference as your arms twist away from neutral and can feel the tension increase on the forearm tendons. Its not 'uncomfortable' per se, but its easy to how a vertical mouse eliminates that tension.

How much better the vertical position is would be a separate question, but if your forearms hurt after a day of mousing its pretty reasonable that eliminating that tension is going to help.

I actually have this mouse

[UniAce]

I actually have an Evoluent VerticalMouse3. I got it because I suffer from tendonitis.

I switch back and forth between the VM3 and a Contour Perfit (optical) mouse [contourdesign.com] because I find that both tend to relieve tension in one area (e.g., the radial nerve) but cause tension in another (e.g., the palm, or the back of the hand).

For the Contour Perfit, there are different sizes and different models for right vs. left-handed use (I use a large right-handed one). They're designed so that your whole hand rests on the mouse, in a "neutral" position (halfway between full flexion and full extension).

I think I like the Contour mouse a little better. I find with the VM3, despite the (very slight) lip at the bottom, my hand still tends to drag on the mousepad.

The scroll wheel, on pretty much any mouse I've tried, is a major culprit for repetitive stress injury. But the function is just too useful to give up!

Probably a bigger problem is the one discovered by rehtonAesoohC (parent poster): fine mouse movements are very difficult to achieve when using your whole arm rather than your fingers. Those larger muscles just lack the precision of our fingers, which is why I often find myself using the Contour mouse inappropriately, with my fingertips touching the mouse and rest of the hand arched up above it rather than laying flat. I've developed a few little tricks to get back some precision, like incorporating a kind of wrist wiggle to move the mouse left and right in a fan-like motion and get the mouse pointer to home in on a specific little point. But that can lead to wrist pain if overdone, and I think especially gives me pain along the radial nerve when using VM3

At any rate, I'm glad to see other recommendations from Slashdotters, and may try a few more mice. Don't overlook the possibility of using several mice and switching between them at times.