Optical or Ball mouse either way you still have to have a good mouse surface. Although an optical mouse doesn't have the addition of the ball to slide on the surface, it still has to slide.

With an optical mouse there's the added vaiable of differentiation in the mouse surface. The optics read the changes in the appearance of the surface. So each mouse is doing two things with the surface. One, sliding on it via the mouse it self, often called feet, and two determining where the cursor is on your screen. Either by the mechanical stystem of rollers in a ball mouse or by the optics in an optical mouse.

What's the point?

Surfaces. When you pick either a ball or optical mouse you need to have a good surface to play on. If you use a ball mouse debris is a concerned. With both mice there's the surfaces reaction with the mouse itself. Just because there's no ball doesn't mean your not sliding it on a surface that could be "tugging" on it, making aiming seem more difficult.

Additionally since an optical mouse "reads" the surface it has to have variation in it. The optics determined whether the mouse has moved because of the difference in the previous scan of the surface. Shiny surfaces or surfaces with little to no variation in color or texture are not good for precise work with an optical mouse.

For years I went nuts trying to find the right combination. The best mouse pad I found was from RatPadz. Eventually I wore dead spots in it, and had to replace it with another. After my second RatPadz began to show signs of wearing I used MouseSkates. I forget the name of the company I got them from, but HyperGlide seems to be the comming up in my searches for them as I write this post.

A solid surface mouse pad, and/or MouseSkates is the best solution to any "dragging" or "studdering" problem you might have with optical or ball mice.

As was said you do have to clean ball mice on a regular basis. You'll find a small strip of debris will build up on the surface of the rollers.

I eventually got frustrated with MouseSkates and solid surface mouse pads and switched to a MircoSoft forefinger track ball. You heard me !!! A track ball. The change over was a momumental pain in the arse, but I think it was worth it. The only draw back is I have to scrub my hands of any oils before gaming. The ball rides on steel studs and after hours of gaming the ball itself can become "gummy" and cause dragging.

I switched over just in time for BF 42' and found it awesome for tank turrets and anything on a 360 degree swivel.

I can't post links till I get 15 posts so just do a search for:

RatPadz
and
HyperGlide