A mouse with a ball system essentially is a track ball. Turn the mouse upside-down and you have a miniature track ball. Your objective could be obtained by making the mouse ball larger. Personally, I prefer a wireless system that does away with the ball which easily becomes dirty causing response problems.

I think by "wireless" sand means "optical";though wireless is nice, too. I have a Logitechoptical trackball with an oversize ball and dirtis not an issue. I've often wished it had opticalsensors underneath so I could use it as a (conventional)mouse as well.

Why not use both? Windows at least, allows conurrent connection of multiple pointing devices.

You're quite right, and I do use both. I wouldstill like both modes in a single device.