Zowie make nice kit. Simple and robust. http://www.zowiegear.com/
I can highly recommend the Kensington Expert Trackball Mouse. I’ve been using one ever since Logitech stopped making the Trackman Marble Wheel. Excellent for gaming, CAD work, photo editing, etc.
That people are still happily paying $80-$100 or more for a freakin’ mouse is slightly shocking. It’s a mouse. It points and clicks. If you’re feeling like Rockefeller, get a fancy one for $30 and stuff the rest of the money back into your state-of-the-art synthetic fiber moisture-wicking ergonomic smart wallet.
Comfort, weight, size, quality of the buttons, tracking accuracy, whether it works on materials like glass and other at-hand materials, the wireless reliability, the battery life…
It goes on and on and on. More expensive devices, the manufacturer may have paid for more R&D and higher end components.
I’ve used $13 mice, $30 mice, $60 mice, and have looked wistfully at the $100 mouse. There absolutely is a difference and in favor of the more expensive ones. Unlike the wallet, which as you say, any 2 pieces of pigskin can keep the green in your pants, the mouse is a tool that many people actually use 8+ hours a day.
So no, take your elite BS elsewhere. So I take it you won’t pay for 16 + gigs of RAM for your computer because it fails to crash at 2 gigs of memory and just operates really sluggishly? You don’t buy $200+ graphics cards because you are happy with games that don’t have nice graphics? You still play on a Nintendo 1 because Mario is all you need?
If all you do is surf the net and go on Facebook then anything will do. If you use your computer all day long every day for work, then it makes sense to have good tools.
My personal machine is an iMac, with factory issue mouse and keyboard, and that’s just fine.
My work machine, however, has the best mouse I could find, paired with an awesome keyboard with mechanical key switches. (not paid for by work, btw)
Most auto mechanics work with Snap-on tools, not Craftsman, for a reason.
I wish they made a left-handed version.
You’ve clearly never had RSI or even twinges in your hand.
I have my current mouse and a cheapie store-branded OfficeMax ergonomic mouse I bought on clearance as a stopgap for $7 before. Both are shaped much the same but there is an obvious difference in build quality and the OfficeMax one feels rather floaty. Not a problem for web browsing but gaming with it wasn’t much fun as it was less responsive and less precise. Even if you’re not playing games that require any sort of speed/accuracy, the OP mentioned photo editing so I wouldn’t want to use a cheap mouse for that either. Others noted battery life, how well the wireless works, cloth versus rubber cords, etc.
Depending on your habits, it’s something you’re going to have your hand on for several hours a day at least so it might as well be something comfortable and that fits your needs. If you’re happy with the stock Dell mouse that came with the computer or some Microsoft office mouse, that’s cool but there’s legitimate reasons to spring for the nicer models.
Just be careful when cleaning it! I was cleaning the dust out of mine this week and one of the ruby ball supports came out and got lost in the carpet.
Kensington doesn’t sell replacement rubies, either. They’re actually replacing my entire trackball under warranty, but if I was out of warranty I’d be out of luck.
I also have a precision gaming mouse; a Roccat Tyon. Plenty of assignable buttons for forward and back, or a left/right paddle switch under the scroll wheel is good for that. It has thumb buttons and also an analog thumb paddle, and even a ‘slow down’ button so you can switch to a lower DPI setting for fine control on the fly, which I find very useful in photo-editing.
And if you’re into bling, you can even program the logo and base to light up different colors! … or turn them off entirely, which is what I did.
To continue the hijack and pile-on, I consider that all of the UI upgrades I’ve done to be money very well spent. That includes a $250 chair, a $100 keyboard, a number of $50-$70 mice, a progression of $300+ monitors over the years, etc.
If you’re spending an hour or less per day checking the SDMB and facebook, any ol’ computer plugged into a $50 monitor, a $5 keyboard, and a $5 mouse will do. But if you spend a lot more time in front of that computer, expensive peripherals and ergonomics will make things a lot more pleasant, less painful, and possibly faster and more efficient.
(That said, IME there’s a big jump in quality and function from any ol’ $5 mouse to some of the $30-$50 mice, but other than NEW AND SHINY there’s not much advantage to getting a $100 mouse.)
Weird; I’ve been using these for well over 12 years (my current on is more than 7 years old) and I’ve never had that happen. Sounds like you might have broken one of the little flanges that holds them in somehow.
Put a some tights over the nozzle of your hoover and use that to locate it. It will not pass through the tights.
Well, hell. Who even needs a mouse? Learn your keyboard shortcuts and run a proper CLI. There. I just saved you thirty bucks!
This one is the closest to the one I own, although mine is shaped a little differently and doesn’t have the obnoxious glow ring. But I’ve been very happy with the quality of mine so far.
Interesting, glanced at that a while back, may have to give it a try. I love trackballs, but hate the thumball variants–but it’s increasingly hard to find a trackball with a scroll wheel and buttons that can act as front/back buttons to replace by Logitech Optical Trackman that is having increasing problems with the left-click button.
Of course, what I really want is for Microsoft to start up Trackball Explorer production agian…
Microsoft IntelliMouse. Meets all of the OP’s requirements and is darn near indestructible; the one on my work computer is at least a decade old. Bought one for my home computer as well when the previous mouse died, five years ago.
I love my m570. Both of them. How do I reprogram the scroll wheel so when I click it (not turn it) I get “open in new link”? The ctrl code is just Ctrl and left click, but when I try to enter that in the keystroke box, I get “Ctrl +” but I can’t enter a left click, or just plain “Ctrl”.
Do you mean “open link in new tab?” I’m not sure, I don’t have the setpoint software installed and it already does that by default. Sorry I can’t help with the software, it seems to work fine without so I never bothered re-installing after I replaced my hard drive last year. If you don’t have other buttons re-programmed for other functions, and it’s just the scroll wheel, maybe try a reset or uninstalling the software, since what you want (if my first sentence is correct) is the default? Hm. Unless newer models are different!
I’m not happy.
However, I know when a 10 dollar part is needed, and when a 100 dollar part is needed. As a prolific hobbyist, boater, car restorer, photographer, artist and all-around annoying person, I thrive by sourcing what is needed, then accepting that certain purchases, while expensive up front, pay off and return savings.
The key is to not opt-in to more expensive things just because they are more expensive, but because you have boxes that must be checked to meet the requirements for a job, hobby and secondary income, and efficient execution of certain commands, superior results, efficiency of time and a happy hand = ROI.
If you don’t know what ROI is, then learn. If you do know, then you’re being rude.
And the information in this thread is valuable info.