On 05/24/2011 01:19 AM, Stan Goodman wrote:
On Tuesday 24 May 2011 at 07:55:32 (GMT+2) Felix Miata
wrote: On 2011/05/23 23:39 (GMT+0300) Stan Goodman composed:
One can view it as a design problem. The failure happened as it did because the photosensors are below the ball, so that gravity drives errant crumbs to cover them. If the sesors were _above_ the ball.... O, wait a minute.... I have to think this out. I've bought several Kensington products over the past couple of decades or so. My newest one has a big hole at the lowest point, ostensibly to pass junk through and out of harms way, but its optical sensor is in a recess that looks like it's designed to capture as much junk as possible on its way down to the hole. Kensington products strike me as having been designed by direct descendants of the engineers of Lucas Electric during the '50's and '60's, the people responsible for the infamous failure-prone electrical systems of British cars of that period. Yes, I had an Austin 1100 back then, first car after I immigrated.
OTOH, my Logitech trackballs all have holes at the nadirs though which most crumbs and other detritus fall out of harm's way. Their optical sensors are located closer to laterally than to the bottoms, and flush, so that there's nothing to catch junk on its way down to the holes. I am, on the other hand, a staunch defender of Kensington trackballs (despite the Kensington support "tech" who told me I could use the bundled software if I would run OS/2 under Windows). They were hard to clean, but they were very sturdy: I gave one at least 6 or 7 years old to a disabled friend because he had trouble manipulating a mouse. I am very happy with this (now de-crumbed) optical Kensington.
On the other hand, I have had bad luck with Logitech marbles.
It's a shame there aren't more trackball designs to choose from. It seems there's at least 100 mouse designs for each trackball design, and most stores don't carry more than one or two at the most. The best trackballs (Logitech Marble FX), like the best keyboards (Northgate OmniKey 102), were last produced more than a decade ago, and cost more now on eBay than they did when new, if any can be found there at all. I have two of the very expensive OmniKey 102, which were very nice until they after mere months. I have since been buying cheap keyboards, which have invariably lasted much longer and are not a big loss when they go. Much like the indestructable Ingersoll dollar watches of the 30s and 40s -- the only watches of the era that you could wear when swimming and that still worked. I'm sure there is a lesson in this.
If I thought for a minute that I could fob the OmniKeys off on ebay...
I *hate* mice. I have used a trackball since the first IBM PC. I think the Air Force invented the trackball, before there were any PCs, and they were right. I have 4 optical Kensington trackballs--3 on computers and one spare! The only trackball I ever had that I liked as well was about 25 years ago--Mouse-Trak Systems. It sold for about $70 originally. It had three buttons, and you could switch it from Mouse Systems to Microsoft. It was mechanical, but had very few problems. When it finally wore out after about 10 years they were selling for close to $300, and that was just too much! (I think you can still get one, if you have money to burn.) Then I tried the Q-Tronix and its clones--a mechanical device that had all the problems described above--continually needing cleaning. I have one of those clones now--it's called an I-One Libra, and it runs the cursor too slowly across a Linux display, and I don't know any way to speed it up. (Earlier versions of Windows had the facility to adjust the speed. I don't know if you still can.) I bought it because it has three buttons, which would make it nice for Linux use. Anyway, because of its low "tracking gain" it's not very usable. Also, the ball doesn't run as smoothly as the Kensingtons. I also tried the kind of trackball that you can hold in your hand. I don't like it. I was hoping to avoid the scratch-pad on the laptop, but I guess not. For keyboards, you can't beat the old IBM model M--I have 2, and they were used when I got them 15 years ago, and they will still be working fine after I'm dead, if some idiot doesn't throw them out for not having windows keys. (You can sometimes buy a refurbished one from clickykeyboards.com for about $70.) --doug -- Blessed are the peacekeepers...for they shall be shot at from both sides. --A. M. Greeley -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org