What Trackball or Mouse Do You Use?

[tomhartman]

I'm using the Apple Wireless mouse, and I love the wireless part but the mouse is awful. They stop working after a few months, and efforts to clean them have been unsuccessful. The scroll ball stops working.

Any other suggestions for something wireless that is good?

Thanks
Tom

[Craig F]

Kensington Expert Mouse trackball is my preference
this has been discussed in the passed

we have several (over 100) of the wired Mighty Mice and no problems with the roller ball

[tomhartman]

Originally Posted by Craig F

Kensington Expert Mouse trackball is my preference
this has been discussed in the passed

we have several (over 100) of the wired Mighty Mice and no problems with the roller ball

You're really lucky...do a search...on "Apple Wireless Mouse Stops Working"....

It's really an issue of having to clean it by rubbing the ball vigorously on paper.

I had the Kensington, nice it finally stops working too (for other reasons) but the good thing is that Kensington has always been great about sending out new ones at no charge. They sent me 3 of them before I finally got tired of it...

TH

[Craig F]

Originally Posted by tomhartman

You're really lucky...do a search...on "Apple Wireless Mouse Stops Working"....

like I said we have the stock wired mice

[Gothboy]

Logitech wireless optical mini on the Pro and Wired version of same on G4. I'm loving the wireless with it's horzontal scrolling...works in PT and gets me back and forth in a session better than my AlphaTrack. I have the Apple mighty mouse that came with the pro but I didn't get into learning how to program it(if you can...?) as I was used to the right-clicking Logitech. I also use an ancient Apple serial mouse for my Performa which is used solely to run Nord patch editing software for the Micromodular.
I have a mi for the Hp PC, an Hp for the Compaq and a few toher mice in a box including those awful Apple puck mice and a few Apple opticals.

[daeron80]

Originally Posted by tomhartman

I had the Kensington, nice it finally stops working too (for other reasons) but the good thing is that Kensington has always been great about sending out new ones at no charge. They sent me 3 of them before I finally got tired of it...

What on earth do you do to them to cause that? I've used Expert Mouse for as long as they've been on the market, both home and work, Mac and Windows, and never had one go down. They've always rocked on until they were obsolete due to new connection types on new computers or whatever. I do have to take them apart and clean out the cat hair, coffee/beer residue, crumbs, and all that gunk once a year or so. Wipe the rollers with rubbing alcohol on Qtips. Then they're good as new.

[Intini]

I am using a Logitech Cordless Optical Trackman for more than two years and it can be easily cleaned and I never had a problem. Great for Pro Tools and for the MAC and PC in general IMO. I also leave the Apple Mighty Mouse wireless connected - as I bought it anyway - but I very rarely use it.
I really don't like to use Pro Tools without a trackball. You save desk space and don't have to move your hand and arm around. But I fell that not everyone can get used to it.

[tomhartman]

Originally Posted by daeron80

What on earth do you do to them to cause that? I've used Expert Mouse for as long as they've been on the market, both home and work, Mac and Windows, and never had one go down. They've always rocked on until they were obsolete due to new connection types on new computers or whatever. I do have to take them apart and clean out the cat hair, coffee/beer residue, crumbs, and all that gunk once a year or so. Wipe the rollers with rubbing alcohol on Qtips. Then they're good as new.

Again, you are lucky. I've used Macs since 1986 and never had a problem with even ONE of them, but I read about people with all sorts of hardware problems with their computers. Some people are lucky and some aren't. The Expert Mouse stopped scrolling, either sideways or up and down, I forgot which, and they immediately sent out a replacement, but it got to be a drag after a couple of them.

[barstool719]

In addition to audio work, I do quite a bit of graphic design, and use a Wacom Graphire 4. It's a stylus pen and a wireless mouse. I don't use the pen with PT, but the mouse movement is super smooth due to the high DPI.

[flommer]

Originally Posted by tomhartman

Again, you are lucky. I've used Macs since 1986 and never had a problem with even ONE of them, but I read about people with all sorts of hardware problems with their computers. Some people are lucky and some aren't. The Expert Mouse stopped scrolling, either sideways or up and down, I forgot which, and they immediately sent out a replacement, but it got to be a drag after a couple of them.

The Expert Mouse (old Turbo Mouse in my case) is by far the most robust trackball. It has huge, metal ball bearings as rollers and they are basically indestructible under normal use.

I had an older ADB version, and I managed to ruin it while trying to clean it, but it was totally my fault. I had taken the thing apart and was using compressed air, but that blew some dust and hair into the bearings. Because they are shielded bearings, I couldn't easily clean them out, so I tried to remove the shields, but that failed miserably. I contacted Kensington to see if I could buy some replacement bearings and they said no, but that they would just send me a new Turbo Mouse. I was quite surprised and pleased as I had told them that it was totally my fault. I received similar support when contacting them about a newer trackball (don't remember the model, but it was inferior to the expert mouse) that one of my associates at work broke.

The lessons I learned: Kensington has the best customer support policy I have run across and DON'T use compressed air to clean out my Turbo Mouse..

I use a Razer CopperHead gaming mouse also (very high resolution)