When I was a little kid, my father would sometimes bring home a Macintosh SE from work. When he did, he'd bring an Apple Extended Keyboard and a pointing device and it would sometimes be a G5431 mouse... but sometimes it would be a very specific trackball.
I've been searching off and on for years, including having an eBay watch with e-mail notifications on any and all ADB trackballs in case a familiar thumbnail shows up, but I haven't been able to find any evidence of it anywhere on the Internet so far and, based on all the other childhood things I've tracked down, my brain prefers to forget memories rather than corrupting them in any significant way. ("significant way" in that I forgot that the "music video" on the inside cover of the 1993 Dennis the Menace (Beano) annual used a font instead of hand-drawn lettering like the rest of the book.)
I remember it having a casing styled to match the AEK and, most significantly, while it loosely resembled photos I've seen of an Abaton Propoint trackball, I clearly remember that the buttons were on the right, neither one had a circular cut-out, and the small button was above the large one. (I assume it was meant to perform a secondary function, but I didn't have the extension to enable that, so they both did the same thing.)
Here's a diagram of the layout I remember:
In case it helps to narrow things down, at the time, my father worked for ComputerLand. I believe it was in some cubicle/skyscraper-based job in downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada, near Union Station, because he later worked for SHL Systemhouse, he brought me into the office after hours once or twice for one of those jobs, I know that's where I saw my first colour Macintosh prior to the iMac and where I encountered caddy-loading CD drives, and I don't remember any mention of where he physically worked changing.
I've been searching off and on for years, including having an eBay watch with e-mail notifications on any and all ADB trackballs in case a familiar thumbnail shows up, but I haven't been able to find any evidence of it anywhere on the Internet so far and, based on all the other childhood things I've tracked down, my brain prefers to forget memories rather than corrupting them in any significant way. ("significant way" in that I forgot that the "music video" on the inside cover of the 1993 Dennis the Menace (Beano) annual used a font instead of hand-drawn lettering like the rest of the book.)
I remember it having a casing styled to match the AEK and, most significantly, while it loosely resembled photos I've seen of an Abaton Propoint trackball, I clearly remember that the buttons were on the right, neither one had a circular cut-out, and the small button was above the large one. (I assume it was meant to perform a secondary function, but I didn't have the extension to enable that, so they both did the same thing.)
Here's a diagram of the layout I remember:
In case it helps to narrow things down, at the time, my father worked for ComputerLand. I believe it was in some cubicle/skyscraper-based job in downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada, near Union Station, because he later worked for SHL Systemhouse, he brought me into the office after hours once or twice for one of those jobs, I know that's where I saw my first colour Macintosh prior to the iMac and where I encountered caddy-loading CD drives, and I don't remember any mention of where he physically worked changing.
Last edited:
