Microsoft Wireless Laser Mouse 8000 & Snow Leopard

After installing Snow Leopard on my MacBook, I failed to connect my Microsoft Wireless Mouse via Bluetooth like I had done with Leopard. The mouse I use the most is the Microsoft Wireless Laser Mouse 8000. I have three of them and I use them for the various computers I use on a day to day basis on Mac, Windows and Linux and they work very well.

Two of them are the 2006 models and the other is the 2007 model and I have noticed that the way that they connect can differ by varying levels of difficulty. The 2007 model connects quite easily using the Bluetooth Assistant, making sure that there is NO passkey set.

I also install the Microsoft Intellipoint 7.0 for Mac first before “pairing the mouse” (which did not install correctly, I got two errors regarding the install. Although Microsoft say that Intellipoint 7.0 is supported with Snow Leopard) but it did seem to install and after the restart everything seemed to work fine.

One Way of Pairing

To get the 2006 model working, required a little bit of fiddling. If I performed the same method of connecting as I did with the 2007 model (no passkey) I would get this unsupported error. To resolve this I had to delete “/Library/Preferences/com.apple.Bluetooth.plist” then restart to reset it back to defaults. This effectively sets the Bluetooth settings back to default settings. Then when you try to connect the mouse again via Bluetooth Assistant with no passkey, the mouse and Mac are paired and ready for use.

Another Alternative

If the above trick does not work for you, try whats on this blog post http://www.derekhat.com/pairing-microsoft-presenter-mouse-8000-on-mac-os-x/. For me the above steps work and other times Derek Hat’s steps work. To be honest this whole process is very weird and very temperamental, it may be time to invest in a new mouse. Might have a look at the new “Magic Mouse” from Apple.