ELECOM DEFT PRO Trackball Mouse, Wired, Wireless, Bluetooth 3 Types Connection, Ergonomic Design, 8-Button Function, Red Ball, Windows11, MacOS (M-DPT1MRXBK)

Don’t be put off by the reviews on this page, which at first sight are horrifying news for anyone considering buying the Elecom M-HT1DRBK “HUGE” wireless trackball. A third of the purchasers found it unsatisfactory or barely good enough (up to three stars). There clearly is or was once a quality control problem with the artificial ruby bearings for the trackball. On the other hand, two thirds of the buyers are extremely satisfied or even ecstatic, and there is no problem returning an item to Amazon. Besides, the cure for the bearing problem is known, cheap, safe and quick, a ten minute job with a screwdriver and instructions freely available on YouTube. In addition, the choice of solid large, multifunctional trackball mice is basically this Elecom or its sister, the Elecom EX-G Pro, which is built with the same upmarket components, including the ruby bearings. I decided to take the small risk.My Elecom HUGE is one of the good ones (or later ones, if it was a batch problem, now solved), with a creamy-smooth action on the trackball, feather light switches, one heavier switch just where I want it, and a slight stiction on the scroll-wheel which adds to the precision. You’ll see I gave five stars, so count me among the happy customers. If a finer grading were available, my rating would be 4-3/4 stars because one of the switches is too light for it to be ergonomic in that position — for me. Also, the mostly plain black styling with just the big metallic red trackball (diameter 52mm!) and a smidgin of chrome on the scroll-wheel, while intricate and extravagantly curved, in the eyes of an artist like me should have been further relieved of its blackness. So the quarter-star deduction is for personal ergonomic preferences and to mark an overdose of Japanese “professional” styling, a.k.a. too much bloody matt black, not fundamental faults.Obviously, I consider the Elecom HUGE good value for money; the nearest comparable Kensington costs twice as much and offers less. The HUGE is solidly built and feels like quality in the hand. I wonder, however, whether the self-skinned soft polypad which adds so much to the comfort of operating the HUGE will last the decade or more of hard use the rest of the trackball seems good for. (If the memory foam skin does wear while the trackball survives, I’ll glue on tan leather cut to shape.)The ergonomics are excellent, with large, huge and massive buttons, and would suit a hand of any size, including very large hands. The hand is spread across the big expanse of the aptly-named HUGE, with the thumb operating three of the buttons plus the four-function scroll wheel, including yet another button function, which I instantly allocated to the left click because it is heavier and louder than the other switches, in the instance of the left click a very good thing. An ergonomic error — for me anyway — was making one of the assignable buttons, the piano key under my little finger, as light as the others. The little finger is just not as controllable as the other fingers. In fairness, it must be said that the designer apparently intended the ring finger to operate this button, with the little finger being unallocated. I therefore assigned no function to this button. As a result I control the ball with my two middle fingers, which is another big win in precision, especially since the HUGE offers three resolutions (500, 1000, 1500dpi) selectable on-the-fly with a slider button under the thumb, so that you can make pixel-perfect adjustments on any size of screen, useful in making fine art or graphic design, indispensable in engineering work, and even in typing or editing when the cursor needs to be placed precisely but quickly every few seconds. I’ve also reassigned the default left-click thumb button to the Mac’s COMMAND modifier key (the propeller) because it is too easy to press such a large, responsive switch and get unwanted results if a direct action is assigned to it. This trackball is so customisable and feature-rich, it reminds me of nothing so much as a puppy eager to please.A word about the control assignment software: The earlier software has been rewritten and repackaged, including into English, and is now excellent, regardless of what you may read in the reviews here. It is easy to make the basic button assignments, and you can even use the trackball for gestures, similar to gestures on Apple’s Magic Mouse or Magic Trackpad. Counting the scroll-wheel’s click and tilt functions as buttons, there are ten buttons, which with the variations and the gesture programmer give no fewer than 160 possible functions. It is well worth spending some time reading the help files for the function allocation software accessible through the software dialogue box. For those with much more intricate needs (games players, perhaps?) I’ve also tested the HUGE with USB-Overdrive aftermarket peripheral management software (free with advertising, $20 without), which is potentially more powerful than Elecom’s free software, but only if you know what you’re doing. On the whole, I think most buyers of the HUGE will find Elecom’s layman-friendly software serves them well.So who is the Elecom M-HT1DRBK “HUGE” wireless trackball recommended for? I’m a writer, an editor, a typographer, an industrial designer, and a painter both in traditional media and digitally. In each of those avocations by itself Elecom’s HUGE would be worth the money and considerably more to me, so for each of them the trackball adds far more convenience than the trivial cost per job. Music and video editing, which I occasionally do, also uses the same facilities and speedy precision. The question isn’t really whether the HUGE is great value for money, but whether each individual buyer would get on better with the HUGE layout of the trackball on top and the scroll-wheel at the side, or with the reverse layout of the sister EX-G PRO, which has the scroll-wheel on top and the trackball at the side, which when you change over to the trackball is a straight transition from the common Microsoft-style mice with a consequent shorter learning curve. Personally, I think the trackball on top with the scroll-wheel on the side, as in the HUGE, offers the best ergonomics — and the learning curve was anyway pretty short.The Elecom M-HT1DRBK “HUGE” is definitely recommended.

I bought this as a stand in for my usual Elecom Thumb trackball mouse as I broke my left wrist and needed a trackball mouse with as many buttons as possible. The Elecom Huge fitted the bill. I have been using it for around 4 weeks now so I am more or less used to the trackball being controlled by fingers rather than thumb. The trackball is smooth (I use it for Dota 2) but I find there are issues with the button size and placements. I rebound the 2 buttons to the right of the ball as left and right mouse buttons as this seemed logical, but they are both very skinny and slippery which isnt ideal. This left me with the option to rebind the forward and back buttons to the left of the ball as other active buttons but that does mean that you have to operate the ball with your middle finger. However, due to the design angles, the Huge seems to encourage you to control the ball with your index finger. Unfortunately this then leaves you with no spare finger to operate the forward and back buttons. the 3 buttons clustered around the wheel are ok, although for some reason the largest one at the bottom seems awkward to hit, probably due to placement of the wheel. All in all its well built and all the buttons are programmable which is very good. I have dropped it a couple of times and it suffered no ill effects.

First of all, this mouse is great. Big, solid build, perfect fit on hand. Lots of functions, buttons, whatever your heart desires is there.It would be perfect, if not for one thing... RUBY BEARINGS! the ball sits (on most mice, not only on this one) on 3 minuscule bearings. In essence, 3 really small balls. On most other trackballs, these are ceramic, perfectly round. On this one, for some strange reason, they used ruby bearings, which are not perfectly round. So, there ball does not run smooth!I have fixed this, after reading another review here, by buying 3 grade 5 ceramic bearings from another popular site. The price was looooow. Very low. The waiting time for them to arrive, looong! A month and a half! But after installing them this mouse is, for lack of a better word, PERFECT. Sweet as cake!

(Edited: they finally responded, but I didn’t see their messages till a month or two later. They had withdrew their help to resolve this. Nice. And here I was considering purchasing it again.)This is the perfect mouse when it works. The trackball allowed me to game and move much faster and without the need to pick up the mouse. They are easy to use and perfect for people with large hands. I cannot say enough about how I like the mouse.Unfortunately, I have had three of these break within months of purchasing them. They seemed to have fixed the dodgy bearing issue as the last one was much better and I found I didn't have to replace the bearings. I would happily repurchase it again if I knew it wasn't going to break within 2-4 months of use which is outside of the limited warranty. Directly contacting the manufacturer is a joke they won't respond. I cannot recommend anyone purchase it till they fix the longevity of their product.