Zero Tension Mouse
The Zero Tension Mouse was designed a few years ago by Dr. Michael Leahy. Its primary purpose is to relax all the muscle groups that cause Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and other repetitive stress injuries. The idea behind this ergonomic mouse is if the muscles in your body that you normally use with a standard mouse can be relaxed while mousing than there is a very good chance you will feel more comfortable, be able to work longer hours without pain, and prevent any future health conditions.
The makers of the Zero Tension Mouse claim that their mouse does this job better than any other ergonomic mouse on the market, but this a bold claim. The truth is this mouse doesn’t do anything better for you than the Evoluent Vertical Mouse, or 3M Stick Mouse does. The marketing of the product may be better and that’s why it is such a good seller. The Vertical Mouse by Evoluent and the Zero Tension Mouse are the two best selling ergonomic mouse input devices, but we think the Evoluent mouse is manufactured better, and will last longer. The Zero Tension Mouse has a high defective rate - which is a sign they are made with cheap materials and/or not put together very well.
The manufacturer’s website goes into really in-depth detail about how all of the muscles in the hands, arms and shoulders work when using a computer mouse. It is interesting information, but the real main function of this mouse is to simply put your hand and wrist in the “handshake”, or vertical, position to reduce muscle tension. Some people find this mouse to be amazing and some people just cant get used to it and go back to a standard mouse.
The makers of the Zero Tension Mouse say that the most important feature of the mouse is it’s ability to relax the shoulder and neck. Truthfully, this is the least important feature because almost nobody is going to rest the weight of their arm and shoulder on their computer mouse. This is something that has more to do with your worksurface, and what the position of your keyboard and mouse is relative to how you are seated. Arm and shoulder fatigue is much more easily controlled with an ergonomic keyboard tray for your desk, an ergonomic mouse is really to ease strain in your hand and wrist… you can’t expect it to go beyond that, or you will be disappointed. Nonetheless, a mouse like this will definitely help any strain you feel in your wrist and hand, unless of course you can’t stand using after a week like most people.
i’ve been using the zerotension mouse 8-10 hours a day for several months now in my job as a network administrator and i think that this mouse has probably saved me from a carpal tunnel operation - i used to experience searing pain daily in my wrist and forearm before using this mouse and now i don’t.
this is my second ZTM because on the first, the buttons kept sticking but thankfully ergodirect (which no longer seems to offer this product) worked with me to replace it. the second one seems to be working as well as it was designed. (hint, hint)
would i buy this again? if it was the only one i could find - yes. but i wish that another company or zerotensionmouse would produce a similarly designed, but better quality option in their product line. Here’s why i think that:
the pros: ease of installation under windows XP pro: - plug and play
one way to solve the carpal tunnel problem
the cons: the quality of the product is pretty shoddy - cheap plastic construction, too light, cheap components.
the cursor moves all by itself, sometimes shooting across the screen - especially noticeable when my hand isn’t even near the mouse! - usually in an upward direction. creates much chaos usually in the form of inadvertently moving/copying objects to places they don’t belong.
the ability to precisely position the cursor leaves much to be desired.
bottom line: if you suffer from wrist pain that is exacerbated by mouse use, then get something like this product and get it quickly - they work! this product is probably suitable for most casual computer users, but if you work with your mouse all day every day or if you need precision cursor placement, then you’ll probably be better off with a different product.