Rating: Summary: LOVE IT!!!!!!! Review: After 20 years as a heavy computer user my right arm, elbow and wrist just started to go. I immediately started paying attention to ergonomics. My three best purchases were a good chair; the MS split keyboard and the Kensington Expert Mouse Pro. Although I see some complaints here about quality, mine has functioned flawlessly for over a year now (knock on wood). The ball pops out easily for cleaning with a soft cloth and a squirt of compressed air cleans the contacts. Two minutes to clean the thing. I switched to trackball to start mouse-ing with my left hand. The transition was easy. The Kensington was easy to install, configure and use. The mouse has four easy-to-program action buttons and a scrolling button. I set mine to left-click; right-click, double-click and show running applications. Since your hand rests on top of the ball it's easier to click the buttons and a lot less stressful on your wrists. Pressing once for double click is a godsend. "Show running applications" allow me to hide the task bar and gain another 5% of screen real-estate. There are also 6 buttons on top of the mouse that will activate any task you want. I'm using mine to pull up a couple of favorite web pages and applications. Since my MS-Natural keyboard has a dozen buttons I'm finding I mouse a lot less and my wrist and arm have healed. I've also learned to use the "windows" short cut keys, especially CTRL-a,x,c,v (select all, cut, copy, paste), The Kensington menu also has click speed, scroll speed, rest reminder, pointers, and acceleration and movement options. I find the rest reminder very helpful. A custom message pops up at your pre-set time to remind you to get up and move around! I've got the movement set to snap to the default button on the page which is usually very handy. I'm not sure why some users are complaining about the scroll button. I agree with some users here that the scroll button takes some getting use to since the scroll button makes this a 5 button mouse! But, you can set one of the action buttons to auto scroll as an alternative. I set the scroll speed to "very slow" and that helped a lot (1.8 Athlon here). The mouse does take up 8K in background processing, but in this day of 128K RAM that should not be a problem. Overall, I am very happy with my purchase and my wrists are estactic!
Rating: Summary: Carpal Tunnel be gone! Review: After 20 years as a heavy computer user my right arm, elbow and wrist just started to go. I immediately started paying attention to ergonomics. My three best purchases were a good chair; the MS split keyboard and the Kensington Expert Mouse Pro. Although I see some complaints here about quality, mine has functioned flawlessly for over a year now (knock on wood). The ball pops out easily for cleaning with a soft cloth and a squirt of compressed air cleans the contacts. Two minutes to clean the thing. I switched to trackball to start mouse-ing with my left hand. The transition was easy. The Kensington was easy to install, configure and use. The mouse has four easy-to-program action buttons and a scrolling button. I set mine to left-click; right-click, double-click and show running applications. Since your hand rests on top of the ball it's easier to click the buttons and a lot less stressful on your wrists. Pressing once for double click is a godsend. "Show running applications" allow me to hide the task bar and gain another 5% of screen real-estate. There are also 6 buttons on top of the mouse that will activate any task you want. I'm using mine to pull up a couple of favorite web pages and applications. Since my MS-Natural keyboard has a dozen buttons I'm finding I mouse a lot less and my wrist and arm have healed. I've also learned to use the "windows" short cut keys, especially CTRL-a,x,c,v (select all, cut, copy, paste), The Kensington menu also has click speed, scroll speed, rest reminder, pointers, and acceleration and movement options. I find the rest reminder very helpful. A custom message pops up at your pre-set time to remind you to get up and move around! I've got the movement set to snap to the default button on the page which is usually very handy. I'm not sure why some users are complaining about the scroll button. I agree with some users here that the scroll button takes some getting use to since the scroll button makes this a 5 button mouse! But, you can set one of the action buttons to auto scroll as an alternative. I set the scroll speed to "very slow" and that helped a lot (1.8 Athlon here). The mouse does take up 8K in background processing, but in this day of 128K RAM that should not be a problem. Overall, I am very happy with my purchase and my wrists are estactic!
Rating: Summary: Good for work, but pricey for home Review: First let me say that I love using a trackball vs a mouse. I have been using the Kensington trackballs for years. BUT I'm getting tired of replacing them every couple of years. It's OK for work where someone else is footing the bill, but at home I'm switching to a Logitech. I have a Logitech Marble FX for my laptop, and it has lasted longer than my Expert Mouse Pro. I just got the Logitech Cordless Optical Trackman for my desktop. It also has mulitple buttons that I can reprogram to do what I used to do with the Kensington. Maybe it will wear out given the usage my desktop gets, and if it does I may go back to Kensington, but I can buy 2 Logitechs for the price of one Kensington...
Rating: Summary: Great trackball for the computer Review: I know many people prefer either a mouse or a trackball. Sometimes both. This review is mainly helpful for those accustomed to the trackball especially the older Expert Mouse Trackball (K64215). I recently bought this trackball for use on my G4 Macintosh at work. Since the trackball is USB-ready, there is no need for an adapter. The Expert Mouse Pro is just a larger version of the older model with many, newly added features. The six buttons at the top act as shortcuts linking you to files, applications, and/or websites. This is extremely handy. Adding and editing these features is easily done through the control panel for the Expert Mouse Pro. The location of the buttons is a bit awkward because you have to move your hand up from your working position to push the buttons. The scroll knob is handy for moving up and down the window. My only problem with the scrollling knob is that the trackball just below it makes it hard for you to access it since it elevates your hand a bit too high. The trackball, itself, glides without any problems. It's smooth and responsive. The color of the device (grey) may not be to some people's liking. The large size and shape of the Expert Mouse Pro may not appeal to those who like small, more aerodynamical input devices. Overall, this is a wonderful device that is not without its own minor flaws. But if you are willing to overlook those details, the Expert Mouse Pro is a great input device for your computer.
Rating: Summary: Good product, but poor quality Review: I like this trackball; it saves a lot of arm and wrist action compared to a mouse, and uses less desk real estate. However, the quality is just abysmal. My first one failed after a few months, and Kensington replaced it under warranty (shipping me a new one immediately, not waiting until I returned mine). My current one is getting ready to be returned, as the main button is starting to stick. The product looks and feels cheap, which is appalling given its price.
Rating: Summary: Relief for sore wrist! Review: I thought I could do without a trackball when I got my new G4, but there is something about any mouse that makes my wrist freak out and I need that hand for, well, everything! I love the programmability, too, never again will I have to type out my ultra-long email address!
Rating: Summary: Excellent Smooth Ball, But That's It Review: I've recently made the decision to begin using a trackball at work, mostly due to comfort reasons. I'm very attracted to the idea of not having to move my whole forearm around just to move the mouse pointer. I have evaluated 3 trackballs so far, one of them being the Kensington Expert Mouse Pro (the other 2 being the Microsoft Trackball Explorer and the Kensington TurboRing). The winner was the TurboRing in my book, but here are my thoughts on the Expert Mouse Pro. The ball is excellent. It is by far the smoothest, nicest feeling ball out of any of the trackballs I've tried. My big complaint is that it is not NEARLY as comfortable as the TurboRing, and that the scroll wheel is in the worst location I could possibly dream of for it. If the scroll wheel were located directly to the right (and left, to keep it symmetric) of the track ball, then it would be a MUCH nicer device. But the way it is currently laid out, you've got to lift your hand and reach above the ball to hit it, which is rather ridiculous. If Kensington would put the metal rollers from the Expert Mouse Pro in to the TurboRing, it would be hands-down the ultimate trackball IMO. But for my purposes, the TurboRing still won strictly because of it's extremely logical layout, and superior ergonomics. It's definitely the most comfortable pointing device I've ever used.
Rating: Summary: A lackluster follow-up to the world's greatest trackball Review: Kensington took way too long to come out with a USB version of their award-winning trackball, and when they did, this let-down was the result. The scrollwheel was an awesome addition - but you need to grow a 6th finger to use it... it should have been on the side for use by the thumb. The 6 buttons on the top are just fluff... a way to boost the price on the mouse, while not accomplishing anything beyond a click to your personal bookmarks in your Web browser. Ptooey. In order to follow suit with the trend of blue and other colored plastics, Kensington used this bluish plastic ball that has almost no traction whatsoever. You can spin the ball until you hit bone before you can move the cursor. I had to take the beige trackball from my older ADB Kensington mouse in order to navigate with this thing. Still a superior option compared to a standard mouse, this was a major let-down from the company that brought the best trackball on earth to Mac users.
Rating: Summary: LOVE IT!!!!!!! Review: love mine... i have one for work that sees VERY HEAVY USE. i got it after a couple of our ITS guys recommended it since i do a lot of programming & desgin in addition to accounting... this product works equally well with both Mac & PC without any difference between the two. The buttons & scroll do not work on either system for me, but that is because i have a KVM to switch back & forth between my two systems & those do not play well when you mix Mac & PC programming... if i hook this up to one or the other system, it works awesome on both, however. My hand used to get stiff or go to sleep on me with an old mouse, but not with this.
Rating: Summary: LOVE IT!!!!!!! Review: love mine... i have one for work that sees VERY HEAVY USE. i got it after a couple of our ITS guys recommended it since i do a lot of programming & desgin in addition to accounting... this product works equally well with both Mac & PC without any difference between the two. The buttons & scroll do not work on either system for me, but that is because i have a KVM to switch back & forth between my two systems & those do not play well when you mix Mac & PC programming... if i hook this up to one or the other system, it works awesome on both, however. My hand used to get stiff or go to sleep on me with an old mouse, but not with this.
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