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Kensington Orbit Trackball
Will this two-button trackball leave your mouse in the dust? You'll either love it or hate it! You be the judge with Kensington's Orbit Trackball. Definitely in the way-cool category, users seem mesmerized by the translucent blue high-tech trackball which is smaller (the orb measures in at 1.75 inches) than most trackballs. In fact, I was hoping to see a blue-neon light radiating from the trackball.  Looks can sometimes be deceiving. Although there's less wrist movement when you use the Orbit Trackball (a plus for carpal tunnel victims), we tended to compensate for the lack of wrist movement by putting more pressure on our fingers and hand. Accustomed to using an ergonomic Contour Mouse, in comparison, the Orbit Trackball seemed small (about 6 by 4 inches). It also took time getting used to the fact that the Orbit Trackball stays in one place and doesn't move around like an ordinary mouse. It is, however, excellent for working on cramped and cluttered desk spaces or using with a notebook computer instead of its built-in pointing device.
Available for PCs and Macs, we tested the Macintosh version on a PowerMac 7300. The Macintosh version comes with a 3.5" high density diskette of MouseWorks QuickStart software and a cable for the ADB port. The PC version, which actually is a combination mouse port/serial version, includes two 3.5" high density diskettes of MouseWorks QuickStart, cables for 9-pin serial port and PS/2 mouse port. We weren't able to test out one of the nicer features, AutoScroll, which is only available on the PC version. Also, the software with the PC version offers a pop-up menu abilities geared for Windows 95. If you're looking for an alternative to the cheesy mouse that came with your computer and you do alot of web surfing, you'll like the Kensington Orbit Trackball. However, if you do a ton of multimedia and graphics stuff, you may opt for a mouse. MouseWorks allows you to customize the Orbit Trackball with useful features like automatic double clicks (open files, folders and apps with a single click!), drags (without holding down a mouse button), slow cursors (perfect for pixel-by-pixel control and detailed work), shortcuts, axis only (locks the curson on horizontal or vertical lines for drawing), instant menus, and more. For Macintosh, you can fine-tune the Orbit Trackball's Application Menu and Menu Lock which lets you display and move between currently running applications with little mouse movement and allows menu items to stay open without holding down the mouse button. Also, you can set up Pop Up Menus which lets you press a designated mouse button to pop-up a custom menu of your own frequently used commands. The Kensington Orbit Trackball for Macintosh retails for approximately $69.99 (the PC version sells for $59.99) and is backed by Kensington's five-year warranty,toll-free technical support, and 90 day no-risk trial.
For more of Tina's in-depth reviews on software, hardware and computer stuff, be sure to visit The REVIEW ZONE. 
http://www.TheReviewZone.com
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