joseph@elbereth.rutgers.edu (Seymour Joseph) (03/03/89)
Folks, I just received a Kensington TurboMouse ADB to evaluate on the Macintosh and Apple //GS. I am sending my Apple // comments to this group in case they might help someone else. The TurboMouse ADB is a trackball graphic input device that attaches to the Apple //GS desktop bus instead of, or in addition to, the familiar mouse. The Turbomouse has a big comfortable ball and two switches, one on each side that can be configured in a number of ways. One of the switches is used to click, as in clicking the mouse. The other is used as a click lock, once pressed the Apple // thinks the mouse button is being held down continuously until you press it again. Using a set of tiny switches hidden inside the back of the TurboMouse you can set which switch performs which function. This allows lefties and righties equal functionality. On my unit though, the right hand button is much easier to press than the left, making left hand operation difficult. The manufacturer claims this is a defect and that a proper unit won't do this. An additional feature claimed for the TurboMouse ADB is chording. If you hold both buttons down simultaneously, the Turbomouse should send a command to your Apple //GS. You can choose which command, from a short list (Save, Open, Close, Print and possibly one or two others) by setting some more little switches inside the unit. Unfortunately when I try to use this feature my Apple //GS simply locks up until I press a key on the keyboard. This makes the chording feature unusable on the Apple //GS. The advertisements claim it works so I called Kensington. The tech support people at Kensington acknowledge that the chording feature simply doesn't work on the Apple //. The marketing people I talked to on the same day insisted that it does work. My experience is that it does not. Additionally, the turbomouse does not work properly with some Apple II GS software. In particular, using Zany Golf or "Skate or Die" two games from Electronic Arts, if the Turbomouse is rolled quickly in any direction, the pointer on the screen will either move jerkily along or (believe it or don't) move in the opposite direction. This makes the TurboMouse ADB unusable with these (and I assume other) pieces of software. In conclusion, The unit seems to be neither well built nor well designed for use on an Apple //GS. It can be considered as a specialized input device for specific applications but not a satisfactory replacement for the Apple //GS mouse. Seymour Joseph ACGNJ Apple II Users Group Coordinator Rutgers Univ. Micro Facilities Manager