Not discontinued as was claimed earlier

A further follow-up from other sources has produced evidence that Apple may simply be upgrading the Magic Mouse to a newer model rather than discontinuing it as earlier claims had said. A new Magic Mouse model could offer upgraded Bluetooth connectivity (to version 4.0) and better support for Lion-oriented gestures, Cult of Mac is reporting.

The initial reports may have simply been based on incomplete information that showed that the part number for the Magic Mouse had been discontinued -- but Apple traditionally does not discontinue part numbers entirely, and instead revises them (sometimes adding a "/B" or similar to an existing part) to indicate an upgraded revision. Although many Magic Trackpad users have reported that they find themselves abandoning traditional mice -- and the fact that Apple now offers a mouse-less option for new iMacs -- it may have been premature to conclude that Apple was discontinuing the Magic Mouse entirely.

Apple is, however, known to occasionally be overzealous in embracing change -- the decision to sell Lion as a download-only upgrade has met with some resistance from customers, as has the lack of backup media. The company has announced that it will soon release a version of Lion on a USB thumb drive that doesn't require a Snow Leopard install for $69 -- a $39 premium over the upgrade version of Lion -- but has left new MacBook Pro and MacBook Air buyers without any easy way to create or restore a failed hard drive.

Eventually, however, precision pointing devices like mouses could become the domain primarily of gamers and professionals, with trackpads becoming the norm for even desktop consumer machines as the idea of gestures spreads to Windows. Some companies, such as Google with its Chrome browser, have been incorporating and expanding multi-touch gesture support for some time prior to Lion's arrival. [via Source]

by MacNN Staff