Dusting off a green trackball

Once again a new package arrived with one of my favorite bits of computing history: it's another trackball!

This time, the trackball dates back from 1994, made by A4 Tech and has a very distinct button placement.

Oh, and the ball is GREEN!

It's a serial device, so once again I call upon my vintage Thinkpad to test it out.

Looks

=>./images/20240224_trackball.jpg Trackball connected to the Thinkpad playing Age of Empires II

It stands out from all the other trackballs in my collection, it must have been locked away in a dark closet for a long time since there is no yellowing whatsoever to be found, in sharp contrast to some of it's siblings on fleebay.

Price

I payed a bit more than I usually would for a vintage pointing device (around €10), but the green colored ball was just too hard to resist.

Button placement

The ball is on the upperleft, the primary button is located on the lower left side and two secondary buttons are on the topright.

It feels a bit uneasy in my hand, but maybe I'm just holding it wrong.

Want to see more balls?

Never thought I would have so much to say about balls, but I just can't stop buying them, so here are some other posts I made on my favorite subject:

=>./2023-09-02-vaseline-your-balls.gmi Vaseline your balls

=>./2023-08-30-90s-kids-trackball.gmi 90s kids trackball

I also found a little bit of history on the trackball here:

=>http://oldcomputer.info/pc/apmice/index.htm OldComputer.info, scroll down to A4Tech WT-5P

You can get in touch through Mastodon:

@rxpz@social.linux.pizza

Dusting off a green trackball was published on 2024-02-24

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