Topic: Using trackballs with CAD

[Graldensblud]

Can anyone who uses both trackballs and mice for CAD offer any wisdom on the relative benefits of each? I've been researching, and can only find a few trackball users who swear by them, and everyone else who sort of ignores them; it'd be nice to get a balanced perspective for me who is considering the switch to trackball.

Is there a speed loss? A precision gain? (once you adapt obviously). Does it make it harder to "mouse" if you use another machine once you're track-ball trained? What about other applications (games...  ) on trackball?

All thoughts appreciated.

[t-bear]

Graldensblud.........
Tried a t-ball a while back for my arthritis (wrist) and it made it worse!  For me, it wasn't hard to adapt at all although I fought to keep precision up to snuff....too touchy or sumpin......
Now I mouse with the right hand and have a Nostromo N52 under the left......Damn but I'm fast!  LOL

[jonesy]

Damn but I'm fast!  LOL

And fairly modest too

[Dinosaur]

I was in the surgeon's crosshairs for carpal tunnel 5 years ago.  I couldn't drive to a restaurant and be able to pick up a fork to eat the meal and some days needed help fastening my pants.  My boss came in with a Logitech Trackball one day and I noticed improvement within a week.  It also took about that full week to educate my thumb to its new role.  I went to a chiropractor who helped undo the rest of the damage to my wrist and never went back to the surgeon.  I have had no further problems, but I still can't use a mouse without almost immediate cramping.  Aside from the no pain factor, I also like the trackball for precision work and have not found any significant drop in speed.  I find it is much easier to set the cursor on a precise point and have it stay in place than when I used a mouse.  I put the same trackball on the home computers and my family seems to prefer them over mice for their needs as well.

[craigr]

t-bear,

'Now I mouse with the right hand and have a Nostromo N52 under the left......Damn but I'm fast! LOL'

What does the left hand do?

I like the idea of using both, but what can you program the Nostromo to do?

I briefly looked at it on a gaming site, but the site I visited didn't say anything about CAD options.

craigr

[t-bear]

All the buttons are programmable.......

Mine looks like this:
normal mode:
top row....erase, pan, z ext, z pre, z win.
second....offset, mirror, rotate, copy, move.
third.... scale, stretch, extend, trim.
red mode:
top row....rect, arc, cir, pline, line
second....prop, orbit, hide, utils, plot
third.... regen, apptext, dtext, pedit
green mode:
top row....F2, symbols, intersect, subtract, union
second....F8, xref, slice, revolve, extrude
third.... pasteclip, copyclip, list, distance.

The d-pad has esc, undo, qsave and flip-tabs
The wheel is enter with roll up = red toggle and roll down = green toggle

There are over 50 commands here at the touch of a finger.....keep in mind ALL these are one-click commands.....no enter required!

[Graldensblud]

Exactly why i've just ordered one, CAD was the first thing i thought of when i saw one on a game site. Esp with the macro options.

The fact that i do strat games, and am going to kill at Dawn of War with some clever macros... is entirely incidental   .

[craigr]

Is it pretty easy to program / set up?

craigr

[whdjr]

What is the connector type?
Is it a game connector or USB?

[t-bear]

To answer both Qs....it's a snap to program.  Hell, even I did it first try!
Mine is USB....don't know if they make it for a g'connector..........
Another thing....you can create multiple profiles....CAD, spreadsheets, database etc....  You could pro'lly even use it for gaming!

[Dent Cermak]

and i have trouble with 3 buttons. next he'll be telling me to get rid of my amber monitor.
now they got me one of them "Minnie" mouses. optical. no ball. 2 buttons and a wheel. damn, I miss my 3rd button!!  

[jjs]

I use a trackball. MS optical one. Problem is my greasy grimy fingers must get stuff on ball which gets on the little ball bearing like things that allow the trackball to rotate. They get gummed up too quickly and are not easy to clean. Ball starts to get hard to turn. I have a pullout keyboard mouse tray and the mouse part is kind of small, so a mouse might not work so well for it. But i may just switch back to mouse, kind of sick of this cleaning problem. Hope I am not too late to answer your question before you make a purchase. I also used the nostromo. Never used it enough to get used to it. I have a gateway 2000 anykey keyboard that i have setup just the way I like, so it was hard to force myself to learn the nostromo. It is really easy to program tho and if I did not have the programmable keyboard would definitely use the nostromo.

[Guest]

Trackballs are certainly a little bit harder to clean.  I've got a Logitech and abso-freakin-lutely love it.  With the Logitech, you have to take out 4 screws, and fiddle with some of the guts to get the lint off the ball.  (there's nothing worse than linty balls)  But other than that, I can't find any downsides to the mouse.  Probably the biggest PLUS to having a trackball is the comic relief it provides when someone wants to show you something on your computer and they start sliding the thing all over the desk!!  It also acts a kind of deterant; others won't be so quick to use your computer if your not in the office.

[David Hall]

I switched to a T-Ball about 10 years ago b/c the mouse I had was a POS and my boss was to cheap to replace it with a decent mouse.  His idea of a quality mouse was the $5 junk you get on your way through the checkout line at local computer store.  I brought in a trackball and pissed him off b/c every employee then wanted a better quality mouse.  It took about a week to learn to use it, but it paid off.  I like the precision and other benefits mentioned above. 

After replacing all the mice at home with trackballs, I had about 2 weeks of complaints from wife and kids, but now nobody even cares.

[Guest]

I like to have my markups right in front of me.  I will typically put any markups underneath the keyboard and put the TB right on top of the paper.  I don't have to worry about the mouse not working correctly or rolling over the paper/mouse pad.  It works out pretty good.