this post was submitted on 17 Feb 2026
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Those balls were usually steel ball bearings with a synthetic rubber wrapped around it. They gave the entire mouse some weight which made the mouse feel better to use. You could clean them with something like soap, but you'd have to be careful not to use anything that messed up the rubber. Some people cleaned them wrong, which caused the rubber to become more sticky and thus get dirty sooner. You'd also risk the rubber becoming harder and not sticky enough, so they would slip a lot. They were basically a pain in the ass and I'm happy we've moved on from that.
Got it: be careful when rubbing the balls otherwise they’ll get too sticky or hard
...
Also that everyone in 90s was cupping balls of steel
B-bb-bb-bb-alls of steel.
For me the extra resistance the mass gave against acceleration made it really good for playing first-person shooters.
Some gaming mice these days come with small weights you can put in the bottom to adjust the heft
I have had a G5, G500 and G502 that used weights. That made them nicer. I think there's probably a bit of a difference between static weights tbat need to be accelerated and a rolling ball that has to start rolling, but I'm not sure. Maybe they are equivalent. I should find a ball mouse and try CS2 with it. 😅