Author Topic: CST L-Trac laser trackball (Read 143449 times)

kidchunks · « **Reply #200 on:** Fri, 04 March 2011, 16:12:37 »

Quote from: ripster;305124

Congrats. I think I have personally been responsible for doubling CST's sales to non-handicapped people.

You as well as many others who have shared the same "this sh*T rocks" experience with the CST.

I started out using the logitech trackball marble which wasn't bad just the lack of a scroller was a pita. I know there was software and different techniques to scrolling with the trackball marble but I wanted a physical scroller. PLUS! I like big balls(no homo :tongue:)

Time to search for a ball!

SexieWASD · « **Reply #201 on:** Sun, 24 April 2011, 07:40:02 »

I'll just leave this here.

http://www.cypress.com/?docID=26943

SexieWASD · « **Reply #202 on:** Sun, 24 April 2011, 14:37:38 »

I don't. The cst is the only trackball that I own. I used to have an old serial ch trackball. I think they are still my favorites.

RPro · « **Reply #203 on:** Thu, 28 April 2011, 14:43:26 »

Hi, I just got myself a CST L-Trac CST2545 3200DPI version. I like it, but I'm finding the ball has a bit more resistance than I would like - it isn't buttery smooth like a (clean) Logitech Marble Mouse.

Is there a way to improve this? Can oil be added to the Delrin bearings to improve the rolling action?

Thanks.

RPro · « **Reply #204 on:** Thu, 28 April 2011, 15:08:52 »

How long did it take yours? I've had mine for over 48 hours now - played some Battlefield: Bad Company 2 with it, so maybe got about 8 hours on it.

RPro · « **Reply #205 on:** Thu, 28 April 2011, 15:24:39 »

What's a synthetic ruby? (Do I even want to know?)

My first great trackball was the Assassin 3D way back in the mid90s for Quake...it could be calibrated so that when you move the ball 90 degrees, so did you Quake character! Ahhhhh fun times, dancing on steel girders while nailing those poor people with accurately aimed rockets...

RPro · « **Reply #206 on:** Thu, 28 April 2011, 15:32:55 »

Hmm I didn't really find that in the wiki - but I did some googling and it looks like some of the older Logitech trackballs use that:

"The ball is supported by three small (~1.2mm diameter) stationary spheres of a very hard material. Previous models appeared to use synthetic ruby, but current production uses and opaque silvery glass-like material which seems to be just as durable. Quite why a hard plastic ball should glide smoothly over three small fixed spheres is a mystery to me, but a touch of naturally occurring skin oil is essential."

(From http://www.firstpr.com.au/ergonomics/ )

So now I know what you mean. Unfortunately, while I love the feel of them when they are clean (but still slightly oiled from my finger grease), I have a bad finger crud problem. It only takes a few hours of use before the crud accumulates on the spheres and I have to scrape away the gunk. Ughhhhh.

Maybe I'll need to buy some thin gloves to avoid the problem of gunk buildup on my trackballs.

redpill · « **Reply #207 on:** Fri, 06 May 2011, 12:34:00 »

Is the internal mechanism for the scroll wheel all attached to the same board as the main rollers? I'm tempted to try to relocate the scroll to the left side of the unit for thumb use but don't know if the internals would support such a Frankenstein endeavor.

Apart from my concern on the scroll wheel location this is the first trackball that has me seriously considering moving on from my MTE.

Oo, or alternatively can the auxiliary plugs be used to enable a secondary scroll wheel mechanism of some kind?

redpill · « **Reply #208 on:** Fri, 06 May 2011, 13:00:10 »

Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080

MTE ball circumference: 14.5cm

It took 2 revolutions plus an additional 9.75 cm to get from left to right. So the total would be 38.75cm to travel the 1920 pixels of horizontal screen space. Is that enough info?

Edit: In the spirit of contribution I'll add a picture with the ball removed in the Wiki under the MTE section.

RPro · « **Reply #209 on:** Fri, 06 May 2011, 14:40:25 »

I wish I could find software to use my L-TracX at a 180 degree angle - having the scroll wheel under the ball is far superior IMHO (and also easier to put a wrist rest there too). Alas, mafmouse does not work in Windows 7 x64.

noctua · « **Reply #210 on:** Fri, 06 May 2011, 14:53:41 »

Quote from: RPro;342621

... - having the scroll wheel under the ball is far superior IMHO...

Yes, you are right, it is quite superior.. i have my CST already modified (extrem)
since 6 weeks.. now i'm brood about the buttons..

redpill · « **Reply #211 on:** Fri, 06 May 2011, 15:14:50 »

These folks also sell individual pool balls if you e-mail them. Personalized, marbelized glow in the dark trackball for the win.

RPro · « **Reply #212 on:** Fri, 06 May 2011, 15:50:27 »

noctua, cool - do you have pictures/links to your mod? Somehow I can't seem to find it...

redpill · « **Reply #213 on:** Fri, 06 May 2011, 23:29:59 »

I'm sure there's some margin of error. I measured several times in terms of ball diameter and never could quite get the manual circumference to jive exactly with the pi*D calc, but in the end I felt my direct circumference measurement was probably more accurate than the diameter measurement so that's what I went with. But more substantially because of the orientation of this trackball it's rather tricky to attempt to roll it straight sideways when looking at the ball instead of the screen due to the offset nature, so I imagine that is also a contributor. And I went very slow to eliminate the potential for auto acceleration. I tried to be a bit OCD about it honestly to give you a good figure as I respect the project, and I'm in the data business so I appreciate the value of real data

redpill · « **Reply #214 on:** Sat, 07 May 2011, 00:36:33 »

So not to dare digress to the actual subject of the thread, but dies the CST L-Trac actually have the laser shining on the ball to determine movement or does it rely on the movement of the rollers supporting it?

And to promptly derail things again I'll just say there are many things about Microsoft that I dislike, so I'm somewhat grumpy about the fact that I'm hooked on two of their flawed peripherals, the Natural Ergo 4k (unfulfilling membrane domes and horrible ghosting but wonderful split/curved ergo, aesthetic look, and with full arrow/insert cluster/num pad that I want) and the Trackball Explorer (which I adore but obviously are not made anymore and my three of them will eventually break down). In terms of the latter, I still do not understand why they stopped making such a fantastic input device; they could have improved on it (like giving lefties a chance) and made the bearings better, but I routinely shock people at the office with my cursor abilities with this thing while they fumble around with their goofy mice and pads. It definitely could use more precision, especially in any sort of paint/photo application, but the ergo aspect of the excellent (and clickable) scroll wheel location, 4 buttons... I'm going to have a really hard time giving it up. But I could just be getting old

ch_123 · « **Reply #215 on:** Sat, 07 May 2011, 02:47:39 »

Having opened one before, the laser points directly at the ball. There's no sensing mechanism on the stabilizers.

noctua · « **Reply #216 on:** Sat, 07 May 2011, 02:50:21 »

Quote from: RPro;342658

noctua, cool - do you have pictures/links to your mod? Somehow I can't seem to find it...

patience, patience i work already since februar on this greater project, the biggest
problem is to get fast enough ideas.. i have no "final" pictures yet but i'm in the
last phase.. and you can believe - to find the right positions of the button's
annoying me..

But i can attest the fact: scroll cylinder under the ball is really comfortable,
the nacked "skeleton" stands beside me and works fine.

kill will · « **Reply #217 on:** Sat, 07 May 2011, 10:34:33 »

i just received mine yesterday and have been using it non stop. thanks for the advice ripster!

kill will · « **Reply #218 on:** Sat, 07 May 2011, 11:15:47 »

mine doesnt have the 1/8" jacks and i bought the most expensive one. what the fudge.

redpill · « **Reply #219 on:** Sun, 08 May 2011, 19:01:09 »

Sent them an e-mail asking about whether they had considered having a secondary scroll wheel attachment for the auxiliary plugs. No response. Which probably means no.

British · « **Reply #220 on:** Wed, 11 May 2011, 08:39:46 »

Bit the bullet as well...

Now though, DPI notwithstanding, the thing is nowhere near being able to provide smooth and precise movement.
When doing large swipes, it's obviously not an issue, but I can't get advertised "pixel precision" (well, dunno if it's really advertised, but I read that somewhere), as small movements are choppy (the bearings are clean).
I guess it's the famous case that involves the need of waiting for said bearings to "break in", though I can't insist enough on how not-precise it is...

Also, the scrollwheel is fine when I scroll "up", but it's a pain when it goes "down": now and then it feels like there's some stuff preventing the wheel to roll, to the point where it doesn't register the scroll.
And once the blocking stuff is passed, it rolls and scrolls again (until a few rounds later, of course).

I'll most likely contact CST about that, after checking more thoroughly at the innards.

kill will · « **Reply #221 on:** Wed, 11 May 2011, 10:08:09 »

judging by your non operating wheel, you may have a defective unit. i have been using mine non stop and while not as precise as a new mouse, it fits my needs fine.

British · « **Reply #222 on:** Wed, 11 May 2011, 11:00:47 »

OK, got the scrollwheel problem sorted out.
Some cable of the main cord was leaning on the left rubber...

Feels way better now \o/

tsoukkinen · « **Reply #223 on:** Wed, 01 June 2011, 10:27:21 »

Hello! First post.

I just got CST Laser Track 3200 cpi model. If I put finger tips to south or southwest on the ball and then go to north or northeast, the ball jumps up rather than rotates smoothly. Can you confirm, if this is normal?

I want to like this, but the action is not very smooth in all directions. For example, it seems difficult to draw straight diagonals. Maybe it gets better, when the ball breaks in...?

RPro · « **Reply #224 on:** Wed, 01 June 2011, 11:13:03 »

I find the diagonals are more stair-stepping like when I try to go diagonal upper-left using my right hand. However, it goes away if I adjust my hand position a little. It doesn't help that the bearings move sideways a little as you move the ball. Maybe I should find tiny washers to fill the gaps hehehe.

kidchunks · « **Reply #225 on:** Wed, 01 June 2011, 12:13:14 »

Quote from: RPro;354171

I find the diagonals are more stair-stepping like when I try to go diagonal upper-left using my right hand. However, it goes away if I adjust my hand position a little. It doesn't help that the bearings move sideways a little as you move the ball. Maybe I should find tiny washers to fill the gaps hehehe.

Funny, never noticed it until I saw this post. Mine does the same but I don't need precision diagonal movement so its no biggie. I usually fine it doing the stair-stepping when I use only my thumb. If I add the middle and pointer fingers, the stepping is greatly reduced.

tsoukkinen · « **Reply #226 on:** Tue, 07 June 2011, 04:08:38 »

I am getting used to the CST Laser Track 3200 cpi.

Downsides:
- There is slight built-in acceleration.
- Straight diagonal lines are more difficult than with a mouse.
- My thumb feels weak for double clicking and dragging. Might be better, if the left button was angled...

RPro · « **Reply #227 on:** Wed, 08 June 2011, 20:34:25 »

Yeah I sometimes notice the acceleration - that's too bad! But it does seem subtle at lower DPI.

SexieWASD · « **Reply #228 on:** Sun, 12 June 2011, 11:53:47 »

So I've been using my LtracX for a while now. Just got done playing a round of bad company 2 with it, 23/3 kill-death ratio, so I'll say it's working well enough. It's really great as a gunner on a tank, you can really rack up the kills when you never run out of mouse pad and can just flick the ball around. It was also a lot of fun to play portal 2 with it. As long as they keep making them I don't think that i'll be switching back to a mouse. Now all I need is for someone to make a wireless hhkb pro 2.

Not quite related but I've bought a new keyboard too,

this one:

If you guys think that you care about key press, go to a piano forum!

charlie872 · « **Reply #229 on:** Tue, 21 June 2011, 07:13:55 »

Quote from: noctua;297637

on ripster's image above (post #272) you can see where you can insert the two
missing switches, he also describe this "modding" in his own thread..

i plan this too, the for- and back-switch are quite practically..

http://www.computerware.co.uk

Alex · « **Reply #230 on:** Fri, 24 June 2011, 11:31:46 »

Oh I want one so badly, but the price is so hard to justify. I'd be browsing the internets in style with one of those though..

Is http://www.computerware.co.uk the only European reseller of the L-TracX 3200 cpi?

keyboardlover · « **Reply #231 on:** Fri, 24 June 2011, 11:56:10 »

They see me Robert Rolling.

They hatin'.

Honky · « **Reply #232 on:** Sun, 26 June 2011, 14:16:59 »

Quote from: Alex;366989

Oh I want one so badly, but the price is so hard to justify. I'd be browsing the internets in style with one of those though..

Is http://www.computerware.co.uk the only European reseller of the L-TracX 3200 cpi?

I mailed el-fi.dk to see if they could bring me one, probably going to receive an answer & price within a few days time, I'll let you know what they say. (They do at least ship to Sweden (for 100 SEK), unsure about the rest of Europe.)

Alex · « **Reply #233 on:** Sun, 26 June 2011, 18:36:52 »

Quote from: Honky;368541

I mailed el-fi.dk to see if they could bring me one, probably going to receive an answer & price within a few days time, I'll let you know what they say. (They do at least ship to Sweden (for 100 SEK), unsure about the rest of Europe.)

Oh thanks, that seems like a possible option.

Uberperson · « **Reply #234 on:** Fri, 01 July 2011, 20:17:59 »

Has anyone noticed the slight stepping fade over time, or with a different ball?

dj christian · « **Reply #235 on:** Mon, 11 July 2011, 12:00:36 »

Quote from: Honky;368541

I mailed el-fi.dk to see if they could bring me one, probably going to receive an answer & price within a few days time, I'll let you know what they say. (They do at least ship to Sweden (for 100 SEK), unsure about the rest of Europe.)

I i checked their retailers site and el-fi.dk was one of them who sold them. Have you heard from them about the price? And i am curious since i also live in Sweden.

RPro · « **Reply #236 on:** Sat, 16 July 2011, 15:03:55 »

Quote from: Uberperson;371629

Has anyone noticed the slight stepping fade over time, or with a different ball?

Yeah - although I've been hacking at the bearings a bit. Finally settled on squeezing the plastic holders a bit to keep the bearings from sliding back and forth so much as the ball rolls. Then I applied a very very very small (more than a dustspeck) worth of Teflon grease on bearings.

steeef · « **Reply #237 on:** Tue, 19 July 2011, 16:42:48 »

Just got my L-TracX in today. Playing around with the DPI settings. I notice with small movements it jumps a little before the cursor moves. Possibly needs cleaning...

steeef · « **Reply #238 on:** Wed, 20 July 2011, 10:45:38 »

Cleaning it out and playing with the bearings did the trick.

I'm not too happy having to reach for the scroll bar at the top, so I found Drag To Scroll so I can right-click and move the trackball to scroll instead:
http://www.autohotkey.com/forum/topic59726.html

thrasymedes · « **Reply #239 on:** Wed, 20 July 2011, 11:04:15 »

Can anyone who has the 3200 dpi model comment on whether it would be useful for a system running dual 1920 x 1080 monitors?

Honky · « **Reply #240 on:** Sat, 13 August 2011, 16:26:04 »

Quote from: Alex;368634

Oh thanks, that seems like a possible option.

Still haven't heard from them, you might have better luck with it.

Kerosene · « **Reply #241 on:** Sun, 13 November 2011, 15:56:27 »

Well, I got my L-TracX from el-fi. Seems real solid otherwise but the scroll wheel performance is uneven. Moments ago I managed to turn it for a long distance without it triggering a scroll event. Also, it's hard to reach for the scroll wheel and the 3rd button. I think the most natural scrolling HW solution for this type of trackball would be a thumb switch that made the ball itself act as a scroll wheel while the switch is down.

I'll only be using the mouse at 3200cpi but it's a bit silly how you have to peek through the buttons at a very specific angle to see the sensitivity LED; CST should clearly have made the ball or some button/surface part translucent.

Razer1987 · « **Reply #242 on:** Tue, 29 November 2011, 03:57:44 »

Just received my CST, kind of disapointed by the weight, it's made of a really light plastic. Like Kerosene, i feel the same uneven performance from the scoll wheel. But i have no prob to reach the third button. The LED has the most stupid location ever, you can't see it, it's not a real problem because you can feel the difference but it is still stupid…
It's my first trackball, so i can't compare it, but i really enjoy it, the shape is nice, pretty ergonomic and the main buttons are perfect. I use it at 1600 cpi for the moment because i have only my little asus eeepc with me but i am looking forward to try it on my hi-res monitor next month…
i try to figure out how i am gonna use the two extra buttons.

I love my new ball, really sexy…

NimbleRabit · « **Reply #243 on:** Tue, 29 November 2011, 09:29:48 »

I haven't experienced any problems with the scroll-wheel so far, and in fact it's probably my favorite part of this thing. I'm sorry to here some of you are having problems, perhaps you can contact CST and see what they have to say?

Also, holy crap I can't believe some of you are using 3200 dpi. Anything above 1600 is way too fast for me, but I like 800 the most.

RPro · « **Reply #244 on:** Tue, 29 November 2011, 20:45:21 »

I've had my CST for quite some time now and while I'm loving it, I still have issues with the ball rolling rather stiffly, with a feeling of "drag" for lack of a better word. However, I think I stumbled onto a workaround - tilt the CST on its side at a >60 degree angle! However, don't tilt it too much though or the ball will hit the ring and not contact the bearings. The left side of the CST should be a few inches off the desk while the right side remains on the desk. I used a sawed-off piece of 2x4 wood to hold the left side up, with a couple of those rubber placemats to keep them from sliding around.

Suddenly, the feeling of extra drag/friction almost completely disappears and it rolls very smoothly even with one finger. I find this arrangement much more accurate. It seems easing the pressure off the northwest bearing loosens up the ball and now it feels like it is rolling on a cloud of boobs!

There is one caveat though - it doesn't seem to work if you try putting it on the other side - it won't work left-handed! Unless you place the trackball backwards and use something like the SakasaMouse app to reverse the mouse pointer axes...

I would like to know if this hack works for you - if there is no difference then I guess my CST has issues!

RPro · « **Reply #245 on:** Tue, 29 November 2011, 20:49:39 »

Oh I forgot to add - you will probably want to use a wrist pad under your hand to lift it up an extra half-inch or so to make it easier to reach the ball without causing too much strain...

RPro · « **Reply #246 on:** Wed, 30 November 2011, 12:31:19 »

Here is a picture of my awesome hack. Notice the monolithic piece of lego to add shock and awe:

[ Attachment Invalid Or Does Not Exist ] 33548[/ATTACH]

My accuracy in Left4Dead 2 has tripled because of this mod. And now 1600 CPI is very usable for me!

RPro · « **Reply #247 on:** Wed, 30 November 2011, 13:01:35 »

The bearings seem fine to me, even after comparing to the pictures above.Although the gap between the brown plastic thingies are just a tiny bit wider (.1 mm?). Maybe the slightly wider gap makes the bearings bounce around more, increasing the drag and roughness. Each bearing seems to spin smoothly and rapidly when I flick them with my finger. Maybe I just don't like the normal feel of the CST as much as others?

Have you tried tilting it to see if there is a difference in the roll?

RPro · « **Reply #248 on:** Wed, 30 November 2011, 13:05:30 »

Oh - as a point of reference - in the tilted position I can flick my fingers and the ball spins for 3 seconds. Any faster and the ball will jumped off the bearings. I can't make it spin more than a second in the normal position without bouncing.

EDIT: Yeah McRip!

RPro · « **Reply #249 on:** Wed, 30 November 2011, 13:33:23 »

Hmmm maybe you're onto something - time to do some experiments (and some cleaning).

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Author Topic: CST L-Trac laser trackball (Read 143449 times)