Trackball or Mouse?

[AdvancedFollower]

I've only used regular mice for ~30 years and no problems so far.
If you have to move your entire arm, you have your sensitivity way too low. I rest my palm on the desk and just nudge the mouse around with my fingers (thumb and pinkie for left-right, middle and index fingers for up-down). This is very similar to using one of those big trackballs.
Main advantage of track balls/track pads is probably the space savings, which can be useful if you have a lot of gear on your desk like mixers, keyboards etc.

[jackoo]

Mouse is suitable for what I do. I tried a trackball once - felt like it needs quite some time adjusting to it.

[kacm]

mouse have with me over 30 years so i cannot adapt to new thing because my arm just adapt to mouse

[machine_spirit]

Mouse, i doubt trackball can compete with the efficiency. 800 DPI, lots of shoulder movement which i think is healthier than the wrist oriented higher sensitivities. Or maybe i mixed that up and it's the opposite. Time will tell.

[zerocrossing]

I hate using a mouse. I’m never without my Kensington Expert Mouse, which is a trackball.

[tywjohn]

I had a huge wrist problems for years and switched to Wacom Intuos Pen + Tablet... at first it was a huge drag until you get the grips with it... now I cannot live without it

You use a pen + tablet for general use?

[Tobi MM]

If Mac, then trackpad, period. And i'd have lots of space on the desk for mouse, but... nope. That small white rectangle with all its touch commands and swipes and everything...

[lauthal5]

I've been using a mouse since the mid-80s. I recently got a MacBook, but interestingly enough, I'm thinking about switching now.

[lauthal5]

...while heavy mice are also still a good choice

[Zed01]

I had a huge wrist problems for years and switched to Wacom Intuos Pen + Tablet... at first it was a huge drag until you get the grips with it... now I cannot live without it

You use a pen + tablet for general use?

Yes indeed, for many years!

[mikeyfam1]

Trackball for my right hand and Trackpad for my left hand. Using them simultaneously is incredible. Kensington and Elecom are the ones to look at. Been using the Huge and Slimblade which are great but I just ordered a Deft Pro and Orbit Fusion to see if I may like that style more. Also debating on getting a new iPad so I can use sidecar and an Apple Pencil as well but I'm not sure how well that works yet.

[Justin Franks]

I used to be a trackball user, but even after over a year of daily use, I never was able to be as fast or accurate as I could with a mouse. I'm sure there are plenty of people that can do better with a trackball, but for most people, I think the mouse is the best choice.

[roman.i]

I bought the Kensington trackball, worked with it for few month then switched back to a mouse. I wasn't able to be precise and fast with the trackball, and it felt like the DPI is quite low on this trackball.

[FJ5]

I tried a trackball (Kensington SlimBlade) a while back after seeing loads of music folk saying it's an upgrade from a mouse due more precision & less wrist pain.

I found the complete opposite, even with a padded wrist support. It just moved wrist pain to a different part of my hand (although I never really had wrist pain with a mouse). It was also really awkward for adjusting parameters on VSTs etc.

As it happens it malfunctioned after around 6 weeks & instead of a replacement I had a refund.

[jzero]

I've been a trackball fan for years. If you're in an office I recommend keeping a guest-mouse plugged in too. I use the logitech trackman marble because I prefer a large center mounted ball instead of the the thumb-balls for many other logitech products. Since lots of DAW software uses the mouse-wheel for scrolling, I should probably switch to a kensington so I can have the scroll-ring functionality... I find with adjusting accelleration settings I can zip all over the screen much faster than with a mouse.