Imagine the shock of finding your gaming mouse on fire while your PC is in sleep mode. This is exactly what happened to Reddit user lommelinn, who narrowly avoided a disaster when their Gigabyte M6880X mouse burst into flames, nearly burning down their apartment. The incident occurred early in the morning, with the user rushing into their room after smelling smoke, only to find their desk engulfed in black smoke and the mouse ablaze.

"I smelled smoke early this morning, so I rushed into my room and found my computer mouse burning with large flames. Black smoke filled the room. I quickly extinguished the fire, but exhaled a lot of smoke in the process and my room is in a bad shape now, covered with black particles (my modular synth as well). Fortunately, we avoided the worst, but the fact that this can happen is still shocking. It's an older wired, optical mouse from Gigabyte," lommelinn recounted on Reddit.

The Gigabyte M6880X, an older wired optical mouse, typically operates on a safe 5V power supply via USB 2.0, making its catastrophic failure all the more puzzling. Images shared by lommelinn show the top rear panel of the mouse completely melted, while the underside remained relatively undamaged. The cause of the selective damage to the mouse's casing remains a mystery, as does the damage to the user's desk and mousepad, which were also affected by the fire.

My Gigabyte mouse caught fire and almost burned down my apartment

byu/lommelinn inpcmasterrace

Gigabyte responded promptly to the incident, launching an investigation and reaching out to lommelinn to offer support. In a statement on the Reddit thread, the company emphasized their commitment to customer safety:

Hi Everyone,

We have been made aware of the incident shared by lommelin regarding the M6880X gaming mice. Our customer's safety is our top priority and we are actively looking into this case. Our team has reached out to lommelin to offer support and to investigate the matter fully. In the meantime, we appreciate the community’s understanding and patience as we work to address this issue.

Best,

The GIGABYTE Team.

In a follow-up post, lommelinn expressed their confusion over the incident, noting that their PC was in sleep mode at the time and that subsequent checks with a voltage meter showed the USB port to be functioning normally. "My PC was in sleep mode," they explained. "Since then, I checked the USB port with a voltage meter and it's fine. No clue how this can happen."