![]() The mouse is large and quite heavy-5.22 by 2.02 by 3.93 (HWD) and just over a half a pound-but the heft is a good thing, too. That the MX Ergo looks so good is fortunate, because at its $100 list price, it's bordering on status symbol territory, especially since you can find several very good mice for half that price. Sure, it's not very colorful, but you're likely to be using it next to a grey or black keyboard, as well as a dark-colored laptop or display, so it probably won't clash as much as, say, the fiery red ball on the Trackman. ![]() Clad in grey, with a silver bottom plate and a silver trackball that vaguely evokes the constellations in the night sky, the MX Ergo looks great on a desk. I temporarily forgot my uneasiness as I set the device up, however. That sounds great in theory, but I was a bit apprehensive as I unboxed the MX Ergo, because I perform repetitive mouse tasks all day long and I wasn't sure I'd be able to do them as quickly as I'm used to if I had to adjust from moving my wrist to rubbing a trackball with my thumb. Together with the thumb-controlled trackball, the combined ergonomic benefit is that not only are you reducing the movement of the tendons that pass through your carpal tunnel, you're also leaving it in a more natural orientation-akin to a handshake-to further reduce strain on your wrist. If Logitech wanted to sell a trackball to people who like using a mouse but want to reduce wrist strain, it was going to have to come up with a new design.Īnd that's what the company did with the MX Ergo, whose main innovation isn't the trackball itself, but what lies underneath: a metallic plate that attaches to the device's body, allowing you to tilt the control surface up to 30 degrees to the right. The pointer and middle fingers move the cursor, while the thumb and ring fingers perform clicks, instead of the other way around on a mouse. If you're used to conventional mice, however, buying the Trackman or another similar product means radically altering your behavior. Sure, trackballs are available from obscure retailers on eBay, and Logitech still sells its Trackman, the earliest version of which first hit stores in the late 1980s. That's a shame, because it requires much less wrist movement than a traditional mouse does, and eliminating precise repetitive wrist motions is a good way to reduce the risk that you'll develop carpal tunnel syndrome. The idea of using a ball as a pointing device has been around since at least the 1950s as a way to control military radar displays, but it's currently a fringe alternative to the mouse as a PC peripheral. Throw in exceptional build quality, useful software, and the freedom of a wireless connection, and Logitech's first new trackball offering in almost a decade is one of the best ergonomic mice you can buy. Also, the potential payoff (a reduced chance of carpal tunnel syndrome) is well worth the effort required to transition from a conventional mouse. Not only does the Logitech MX Ergo Wireless Trackball Mouse ($99.99) make my wrist more comfortable during a long day of pointing and clicking, but as someone who never used trackballs during their heyday 20-or-so years ago, I find the learning curve to be shallow. Best Hosted Endpoint Protection and Security Software.
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