If you’re a professional engineer, chances are you already have some experience using a trackball with Pro Tools or another DAW. As the preferred method of travel in many commercial studios and post facilities, the trackball gives engineers some key advantages in navigating their sessions, versus using a traditional mouse. In the paragraphs below we’ll explore some these advantages, and look at some trackballs from Kensington.
Whether you’re a bedroom engineer or producer, or a seasoned pro who works on audio to pay the bills, everyone across the board can agree on one thing: editing and mixing can take a really long time, and require hours upon hours of sitting at the computer. If this sounds all too familiar to you, especially if you’re experiencing some of the nagging aches and pains that tend to spring up during extended sessions, the importance of ergonomics cannot be overstated. Although not everyone agrees, many people find that using a trackball provides added comfort and reduced strain on the hand and wrist. This is mainly because its design allows you to move the cursor infinitely in any direction without needing to reposition the device itself, allowing you to get where you need to go on the screen with less hand movement than a traditional mouse. This boundless quality comes in extremely handy for multi-screen DAW setups with miles of digital real estate to cover, whereas a normal mouse can only take you as far as the edge of your mouse pad.
The trackball you’re most likely to find in professional recording studios and post facilities is the industry-standard Kensington Expert Mouse, which features a large 55mm ball, four customizable buttons, a detachable wrist pad, and a scroll ring. By default, the top left button on the Expert Mouse conveniently allows you to cycle through edit tools in Pro Tools. For me, having a dedicated button for the tool cycle function is great because I find it easier to get to than its toolbar or keyboard shortcut equivalents. I also love the wrist pad that comes with the Expert Mouse because it forces me to keep my wrist straight, which helps prevent arm and shoulder pain.
Kensington Trackball 4-Button USB Expert Mouse
Also available in a wireless version, the Expert Mouse Wireless Trackball unchains you from the constraint of USB cables. This trackball connects to your computer via a 2.4 Ghz USB nano receiver or Bluetooth 4.0 Smart (LE) and features a DiamondEye optical sensor for precise cursor control. Like the wired version, it has a scroll ring that allows you to quickly navigate up and down screens, comes with a detachable wrist rest, and features an ambidextrous design.
Kensington Expert Mouse Wireless Trackball
Another popular model from Kensington is the sleek SlimBlade Trackball. Like the Expert Mouse, the SlimBlade has four buttons and a 55mm ball that really has some weight to it, which for me is far more natural for scrubbing audio than a conventional mouse. I didn’t find this one to be quite as ergonomic as the Expert Mouse, mostly due to the lack of a wrist rest. But, I did prefer its unique scrolling mechanism, which allows you to scroll with a simple twist of the 55mm ball, as opposed to the Expert Mouse’s scroll ring. The SlimBlade also has a braided cable sleeve, which I think is a nice touch.
Kensington SlimBlade Trackball
The Orbit Optical Trackball is a another wired Kensington trackball that features a simpler design, with just two buttons, no scroll wheel and a medium 40mm ball. Naturally, the Orbit Optical uses optical tracking, and sports a particularly ergonomic design that makes it one of the more comfortable models to use. However, as with the SlimBlade, I would have preferred that it come with a wrist pad to help keep my arm straight.
Kensington Orbit Optical Trackball for USB and PS/2
The two-button Kensington Orbit Wireless Mobile Trackball comes with a tiny 2.4 GHz wireless receiver that discreetly connects to your computer’s USB port. This one is great because you can move around the room and still have some control over your production software. This can come in handy, for instance, if you’re recording yourself playing a synth part with a keyboard that’s set up across the room from your computer, because it allows you to control your DAW’s transport remotely. The Orbit Wireless runs on two AA batteries and features a touch pad scroller, along with a compact 32mm ball.
Kensington Orbit Wireless Mobile Trackball Mouse
My personal favorite of the bunch, in terms of ergonomics, is the Orbit Trackball with Scroll Ring. Like the Orbit Optical, this trackball has a medium-sized 40mm ball. But unlike the Orbit Optical, it comes with a firm wrist pad that really makes this a solid model, plus it has the scroll ring, which to me, is a necessity when working in a DAW with rows and rows of tracks to navigate.
Kensington Orbit Trackball with Scroll Ring
For customizing these trackballs to your own personal workflow, Kensington offers a great free program called TrackballWorks. You can assign functions like copy, cut, and paste to available buttons, create “chording” shortcuts by assigning a hotkey to a combination of two buttons pressed at once, adjust cursor acceleration, and more. Keep in mind that these advanced functions will work in many programs, but some software may not support them.
