One of the movement sensors in my Microsoft Trackball Explorer has failed and right now I am using a mouse. Ugggh! I'll got steal one of the various Logitech trackballs spread around the house, but they all have issues. The Trackman has a horrible placement for the scroll wheel. Others have marbles for the thumb rather than a big ball for the fingers and at least one trackball is working around here without having a scroll wheel at all! (The one at the dinner table, for when I dine alone).

My question is, why have trackballs fallen into disfavour? Seems to me that trackballs are great for crowded desktops (you know, the one with keyboards, notes, pens and coffee cups), and for laptops with those hated overly-sensitive touchpads. But right now, it seems to be a choice between that Logitech Trackman and some Kensington models that lack scroll wheels.

All I want is a nice big ball to manipulate with the fingers and two buttons on the thumb side with the scroil wheel between them. Placement of other buttons is completely optional. Is that asking too much?