USB Ports Hidden Inside Gaming Mouse

[Gigawatts] built a pair of USB ports into his mouse and there’s enough room to plug-in small USB drives and dongles. After seeing Thursday’s storage mouse hack he decided to tip us off about the post.

He started with a Logitech G5 gaming mouse. The wireless version of this mouse has a battery pack, but on the corded version this space is used for a weight cartridge. Since he didn’t really care about that feature he ditched the weights, added a USB hub inside, and positioned the dual ports as seen in the photo. The void is deep enough for the mouse to function normally while hosting medium to small-sized devices. This is a fantastic solution that’s at least as impressive as Apple adding USB ports to a keyboard. We’d love to see it as a factory option.

Update: Video after the break

[flickr video=http://www.flickr.com/photos/22446672@N00/5051945013/]

26 thoughts on “USB Ports Hidden Inside Gaming Mouse

  1. I own a G500 (its similar to the G5) and I can see how the hack would be carried out, since it uses the same style weights. I been looking where to unnecessarily stick a USB hub inside of a device for a while. I think I would find the hub inside of a mouse not very practical. But then again ingenuity does not always equal practicality. I would still give Gigawatts credit for squeezing a hub into such a small space such as a mouse and keeping the mouse operating.

  2. Stop mouse usage, only to flip it over and plug something in… I can kind of understand the idea but personally I never leave USB mem sticks plugged in for more than a minute, in which case the keyboard-mounted ports would make more sense. This has its uses though, what about usb bluetooth dongles and stuff, devices that you might want to leave plugged in semi-permanently. You could avoid tying up the few ports available on the front of the PC, and not need an ugly hub sitting on the desk.

    I’m just surprised it fit… but I guess he got the right mouse to try it with.

  3. I think this handles the whole “a hub will show up when you plug in your secret storage mouse” quite well. Much more useful this way imo (if your gonna put a hub in your mouse)

  4. what i was thinking when i saw the last one: i would like to see a normally functioning microsd slot, click in, click out, on a mouse. normal size SD would be ok too, but only as horizontally mounted. microSD would just be easier to make unnoticable, and you wouldnt have to find your micro to standard sd card adapter

  5. maybe , he did this just so he can connect his wireless mouse dongle and get good coverage as both are on the same desk (wireless mouse and the other mouse) and also hide the ugly dongle out of his sight

  6. Apple didn’t invent adding USB ports to a keyboard, nor would it be impressive if they did.

    Man, this dumbing down of the term ‘hack’ and the general low quality of the articles is ruining the blog, but pushing Apple in my face has killed it.

    Goodbye.

  7. Sony use to make a mouse that had a MemoryStick slot in it. I’m not entirely sure why.

    And Dell have had USB ports in keyboards for a while. Quite handy, but the downside it the one I have is only USB 1. Still ok for the mouse & graphics pad I have.

    I got a cheap hub off eBay to ‘upgrade’ it to USB 2. Someday…

  8. I seem to recall Apple had a mouse port on their keyboards before USB existed, though I was very young at the time, so my memory may be a bit fuzzy.

    Anyway.

    My best friend has a Logitech G9 which died, and when I mentioned a hybrid of this and the onboard storage mods, he gave it to me :D

    The G9’s weight slot is on top, but it has a secondary housing that has to be removed for access. I’ve tried with the weight tray, though, and it can still be used perfectly well even with significant volume sticking out the back. It’s a bit narrow, though, I’m probably going to file it out to accept devices of a more typical scale.

    The nice thing about the top-mounted weight slot, of course, is that the mouse can be used with significantly larger devices plugged in than the G5, or I can instead use up to 2 very tiny devices and simply replace the cover. I’m planning on hiding a pair of the 7-gram weights directly inside of the mouse body, so unless you plug it in(or remove the cover), it should be entirely indistinguishable from a stock G9.

    Except for the non-stock cable replacement, as the stock cable is utterly and completely shot. I probably will want to cannibalize another nonworking mouse.(Never liked the G9’s cable, anyway)

    However, I have another mod that I need to finish before I can start this one.

  9. this is cool as a tech you could have a usb drive with all your diagnostic software, o/s images etc and a usb wireless adapter (with drivers in usd drive) mounted in to the mouse for diagnostics.

    just plug the mouse in load the wireless driver and you have internet even if the pc’s own wireless adapter is down (assuming it is not ethernet only router).

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