well, i hit 90 views and not a single response...so time for some modification. do any of you have an electric ICE T trackball, and if so, how do you like it? i really want a blue trackball...if it lights up, thats cool, if not no big deal. a friend of mine has a happ trackball, it works great. i have found reviews of the utrak, which seems to be a great product as well. u have not found a good review of the electric ice t trackball though. i really just want the best option. as long as it is blue, or can be lit up blue, i am OK with it. mainly though, i want it to be smooth and responsive. for those of you with a utrak..does the usb interface allow for mouse buttons to be connected?
thanks for any help you can provide...
original post is below:
well, i hit another snag in my upgrade project. i finally got the money together to order my u360s and misc buttons and things, and my monitor died....no big deal, i'll get another here shortly...but then today i am building a temporary control panel to mount my new stuff in, to see if i like the curved button layout and to test my trackball mounting plate installation...and as it turns out my trackball no longer works.
i have an old WICO 3" trackball that was lying broken in the bottom of the empty cabinet i bought a few years ago. the rollers were really worn, bearings were shot, and part of the plastic housing that holds the roller in place was broken off. i managed to fix the housing so that the bearing was held tightly in place, replaced the rollers and bearings and got it working using a hacked mouse. even with the new rollers and bearings, it doesnt feel very smooth..even after extended playing it, it is rough, and quite noisy....anyway when i hooked it up to my other pc tonight, it woudlnt move left or right..just up and down. first i suspected my mouse hack of being the problem, but after checking connections, and swapping a few things around, it seems as if one of the optical circuit boards in the trackball is dead. if i swap them, it stops moving up and down and left and right work just fine.
so now i need to get a new trackball. my original plan was to build the new panel with teh u360s and new buttons...i bought a trackball mounting plate so i could use my wico ball w/ mouse hack for a while. eventually i was going to buy a turbotwist spinner and connect my trackball to it's interface, eliminating my mouse hack...and eventually replace the trackball. but that isn't going to work out. i want a trackball much more than a spinner, so it has to come first. i looked around at my options, and while some are cheaper than others, i dont want to save a few bucks now, only to regret it later and have to spend more to replace it again.
x-arcade has their trackball controllers on sale right now for $49.99, which is a good deal.. however they are plain white balls, and i have no idea how they compare to the other available options. i just bought the u360s to replace my x-arcade controls that i am currently using...so i am afraid i will not be satisfied with this product as well.
the color scheme on my cabinet is blue and yellow, so ideally i would like a blue trackball. this leaves me with 3 options that i could see:
a standard happ 3" trackball, these come in blue. i can use my mouse hack until i buy the turbotwist spinner later
an ultimarc U trak, i can get the pearl ball and then purchase the optional lighting kit to make it blue
an electric ICE unit. once again, get the pearl ball and use the inlcuded lighting to make it blue.
all will cost me around the same ammount of money. i dont necessarily need the trackball to light up, but it would be nice i guess. i did some searching on the forums, but i couldn't find the right info that i need to make this decision.
the Utrak is cool, since it doesnt require a mounting plate..however i already have a mounting plate, so that is no big deal. i plan to route out the top of the panel so the mounting plate sits flush with the wood, and then cover it in plexi. i also couldn't see if the utrak interface supports mouse buttons or not. plus with my 3/4" panel, it would require some routing anyway to get a good fit.
you cannot go wrong with a happ ball, but it needs to use my mouse hack, and is not backlit
so i am leaning towards the GGG electric ICe trackball. it is the most costly out of the choices, but also includes everythign you need in one package....
i looked around but didnt see any reviews of this product....does anyone here have an electric ICe trackball, and if so, how do you like it? it is alot of money to spend on something..i want to make sure it is going to be awesome. i see that there is an optional wiring harness to connect mouse buttons, and I am assuming it will work with a 3" happ mounting plate...is this correct?
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Topic: trackball dilemma...MODIFIED: need review of Electric ICE-T trackball (Read 5040 times)
