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Q: Poor Bluetooth reception and jerky mouse
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Jan 8, 2011 3:36 AMby Robert Farthing,X423424X wrote:
The nobblynoel stuff appears to be for a 2009 mac pro. But your sig says you have a 2010 mac pro. I thought the BT stuff was supposed to be harder to reach on the 2010's. Or is it? Do those 2009 instructions apply equally to the 2010's?
FWIW I gave up on the internal BT for my mouse (and trackpad) and just us a dongle plugged into the back of my monitor.
My Pro is a Mid 2010 (latest) model. The bluetooth card is very easy to get to, it's just a bit further towards the back (and you can't get the wires mixed up with the wi-fi connectors). Just slide out the processor tray, and there it is!
I went overboard and purchased a 12" lead, as a 6" would be a bit of a stretch.
I slipped the little clear tube over the old connector to insulate it.
I've used mini U.FL connectors before, but even so, I found it easier to take the BT card out (one screw and a connector) to click the connector on...they're TINY!
I've taken photo's of mine, but not sure if you can post then on this forum, so I've put them here;
http://www.rrsport.co.uk/gallery/index.php?cat=10671
Can someone let me know if they can see them?
Thanks.
Bob. -
Jan 8, 2011 12:04 PMby X423424X,I can seem them. Thanks. Here's a case of a picture being worth a 1000 words If it isn't too much bother could you add a closeup of the wire connection to the board?
I guess my only concern with this modification is a the sacrifice of a slot port. It would be nice if there was some other way to get the antenna connection out of the box although I guess the one used is the least destructive. -
Jan 9, 2011 11:36 AMby Robert Farthing,It's very odd, I've just been into the local Apple Store, and tried their MagicMouse/MacPro setup, and it worked no problem up to about 5 feet (that's as far as the security cable would stretch). The Apple guy said he had never heard of any problems with the Pro and BT issues.
Does this mean there are just a batch of a few isolated cases?
Is it a batch of faulty BT antenna (as the BT circuit works fine with another aerial attached)?
If so, why has the fault cropped up so many times over a long time period (years)?
If one Pro works o.k., why don't they all?
I'm very confused.................
Bob. -
Jan 9, 2011 11:24 PMby X423424X,I think the mouse reception depends to a large (?) degree on what's physically between the mouse antenna and the mac pro antenna. In my case I have my mac pro on the floor around the front of my (1" thick wooden) desk somewhat hidden by another desk which is at right angles. The signal (such that it is) has a line of sight that goes partially through the mac pro itself and a couple layers of furniture (end of one desk and up through my work desk where the mouse is -- about 5 or 6 feet.
Personally I think it's the antenna in the magic mouse that leaves a lot to be desired ("Magic Mouse-gate" :-)). I base this on the fact that I also have a magic trackpad. It would loose connection sometimes but it didn't behave nearly as bad as the mouse did. In addition, I looked at the signal strengths with the Bluetooth Explorer (included with the XCode developer tools) and the trackpad always had a higher signal than the mouse.
Currently a cheap bluetooth dongle solves my sig strength problems (plugged into the back of my monitor). But I took interest in the modification described above as a possible alternative approach. Not sure I will do it but it's nice to know there's a reliable alternative. -
Jan 10, 2011 10:21 PMby itsamacthing,Brand new Mac Pro here and I'm reporting that my Magic Mouse looses connectivity almost daily. I work right next to my MP. I can reach out and touch it. Did I really just pay 6K for a mac that has poor BT connectivity? I'm trying to enjoy my new baby and ignore the lack of enough USB ports, etc...but this BT issue is really annoying. I'm going to be calling their support again today. Kinda wish Apple wasn't so popular like back in the day when they had time to make sure every detail was perfect. -
Jan 11, 2011 1:04 AMby X423424X,Well if you're that close to the machine I'll suggest the obvious. Did you check the battery level? Did you check that the batteries are in contact with their terminals? I mention that last point because I read in one thread (I read so many I don't remember where I read it) that some found that they needed to shim up the battery because it's positive terminal wasn't making good contact. Yeah, I know, 6K for a machine that includes a mouse and you have to put some kind of dinky crap in the mouse compartment to make it work!
Best solution is probably to call applecare. Their "solution" in a case like this is to simply replace the mouse. I went through that "ritual" before I realized it was a probably signal strength problem and got the dongle. Hey, you got nothing to lose and maybe you'll get lucky with the replacement
And finally, yeah, I think the days when they worked right out of the box are apparently over. Sigh I also had video card problems too but that's another story. -
Jan 20, 2011 5:16 PMby John Birchfield,This is a hardware issue pure and simple. I bought a usb bluetooth dongle about five months ago and I haven't experienced any bluetooth reception issues since. I own a Motorola bluetooth headset and it didn't work properly with the internal bluetooth antenna. The graph I put up in the thread earlier shows that. This tells me that it is a hardware issue not a software issue. The problem lies with either the case or the antenna itself. The problem needs to be addressed so it doesn't end up like the ATI X1900 XT graphic cards that took 5 years to issue a replacement for fault cards. -
Jan 31, 2011 8:37 AMby Infotech 24 7,I've come to this really late and I didn't want to read 20 pages so apologies if this has been mentioned. I had the same problem today and it was driving me crazy because mine had always been ok. Turned out it was my cordless phone (not mobile). moved that 6 feet away and it's been perfect since.
Of course you may not have a cordless phone anywhere near you in which case my suggestion is useless. -
Feb 3, 2011 2:42 PMby John Birchfield,I don't think that cordless phones are the cause. If phones were the cause then the Bluetooth in my iPod touch and the dongle that I bought would have the same problem as the antenna in the MacPro. As a matter of fact they work great compared to the antenna in the MacPro. -
Feb 20, 2011 10:25 AMby shaneosan,Just throwing my name in the pot as well in case Apple wants to contact us. My "mighty" mouses response time was never the best ... but I was able to tolerate it as I spend most of my time on my Wacom. However the other day I bought a LaCie USB 3.0 drive (which comes with a PCI USB card & drivers)... and the end result was a completely useless mouse... but only when I plugged the drive into the PCI card. Plugging the drive into the USB 2.0 ports resulted in usual sluggishness.
BTW... if you think the Apple support is bad.. you should try LaCie. They were so useless it was comical.
Currently running a Mac Pro Quad. -
Feb 21, 2011 9:39 PMby jo-mac,I received a magic mouse for XMAS and was ready to return to apple due to poor skipping & stuttering performance with my Mac Pro. Until I saw your post - I switched the bluetooth module antenna wire with the Airport antenna wire. Put my Mac Pro back together, started it up and now I have Super smooth performance and response. THANKS for posting this info. if you have a 2006 mac Pro and have weak bluetooth range here are the notes I followed to correct the problem:
http://www.thelocale.org/files/howtos/mac-pro-bluetooth-howto.pdf -
Feb 24, 2011 4:16 PMby John Birchfield,Most of the people here in this thread have either a 2009 or 2010 Mac Pro. With that said you can't switch the wires around because Airport is in the front and Bluetooth is at the back of the case in those models. I believe the engineers/designers at Apple designed these models this way to keep the wires from being switched like previous models.
