Oh, is that what you mean by “button mouse”. I’ve never heard it called that. I’ve heard “pointing stick”, “erasor head”, “pointing nipple”, and “clit”, and variants along those lines. I’ve never heard anyone call it any form of “mouse”.
Yeah, one of my first work laptops had that, and no touch pad. I developed serious ergonomic issues, and got a a USB touch pad as a replacement. And I’ve never looked back.
You certainly could control how fast it went, by how hard you pushed. In terms of raw precision, it was probably the best pointing device I’ve ever had. If only it hadn’t caused pain. But it was awesome. I could select a point very precisely, and also, never run out of space to keep moving it.
What I’ve learned from this discussion is that your arm coordination is much better than your finger coordination. I’m the reverse. It’s because i tend to attempt to move my mouse with my hand, not my arm (because my fine motor coordination is much better than my gross motor coordination) that i get cramps from using a mouse too long.