3D Connexion mice

[Rotary Ninja]

Well actually, the Explorer has the same keys sort of. So I guess I don't see what is different between them.

[uncle_dolan]

This may sound silly, but are all of these 3d mice fully compatible with mastercam? I do not have one on my pc, but the boss has an old asteroid, and he uses it for solidworks, but not in mastercam because he claims it is not compatable? We will be getting issues new work rigs in the next couple of weeks so would be an ideal time to put in a request for one if it will work with mastercam. I only use mastercam here, no other cad/cam package. I used to use an asteroid with NX at my last workplace and know how valuable they are! having said that...ive grown fairly efficient with the old mouse and keyboard combo and hotkeys!

[gcode]

The 3D Connexion devices are all fully compatible with Mastercam X products.

They work with V9 but are dangerous. With V9, a mouse click is required to disengage the 3D device

Under the rigth conditions, failure to do so can cause the model to explode.

[gcode]

If you're going to buy one, check Amazon, they will be much cheaper there

If you have a student id you can save even more buying from the online shops that cater to students.

Personally, the Space Mouse Pro is as low as I'd go.

It's much more ergonomic than the Space Explorer. You'll be using this for 8 to 10 hrs a day

for years. It's not a purchase to save $100 on IMO

[BOATDUDEGUY]

I can't work without it. I bought a Space Pilot on ebay a few years back for $100 bucks. I've converted a handful of other people since then as well. It's agonizing to see somebody fumbling around in Mastercam without it now.

 

Can you elaborate abit more

Exactly what do you use it for in mastercam

I use hot keys for speeding things up and often feel I could be doing things a bit faster

[LancoUSA]

Uncle_doolan. We use astroid ball here on solid edge. It worked great for that. It did absolutely nothing in mastercam. I ended up spending 59.00 that the company would spend for a g13 LOGITECH gaming board. The shop would not spend the money for the space mouse. What i have works well you can make macros to do certain keystrokes by pushing one keystroke. Rotate uses a key and moving the mouse. Not Ideal, but it works.

[cadman2112]

Space Pilot Pro

 

I started out with a Space Ball in NX2 and MCAM V9, I found the entire WCS could be ripped apart by the Spaceball if you didn't simply click in the screen once to give control back to MCAM. Once I understood that I have never in the past 10 years been without one, nor would work without one.

 

They're not difficult to describe but the actual usage comes so naturally that after a month you'll swear you'll never work without one again.,

 

Hotkeys are passe'

[gcode]

Can you elaborate abit more

Exactly what do you use it for in mastercam

I use hot keys for speeding things up and often feel I could be doing things a bit faster

 

after you learn to use one it's like you're holding the model in your left hand

you spin it roll it zoom it pan it whatever without a conscience thought.

 

Another benefit is it takes all the view manipulation work you currently do with your mouse hand

and moves it to your other hand.

If you've been doing this for any number of years, you've got sore fingers, wrists etc ...

Moving half the workload to your other hand is a big deal.

I've known guys who quit this business because it was too painful to work.

A Space Pilot can add years to a carreer that might be ended by carrpal tunnel syndrome.

[Bill Henderson]

I just tried yesterday to put my 5000 on this system at work. It is about 8 years old and the Windows 7 doesn't recognize it. 3d doesn't support the driver for Win7 from what I can tell.

 

Kind of a bummer.

[Jayson Kramer]

Boatdudeguy, when you watch me do the webinars you can see me moving the model around and picking real smoothly. this due to use the space unit and the mouse at the same time.I am a key person to. so some time my hand will leave one or the other to hit keys.

 

But like these folks say It drives me crazy to not have one. I now on 5 units my self my wife got me the newer laptop one for Christmas and this little unit is great.

 

Here are just a few of mine.

[cadman2112]

I just tried yesterday to put my 5000 on this system at work. It is about 8 years old and the Windows 7 doesn't recognize it. 3d doesn't support the driver for Win7 from what I can tell.

 

Kind of a bummer.

 

there is not an x64 driver if you have a serial port connection one, I had to retire one about 4 years ago because on this

[Jayson Kramer]

I have one of the old serial port ones saved some were I was lucky that I got it to run in Xp 32 bit years back. you can get a a Navigator pretty cheap these days.

[RayD]

used one for a long time when I was programming full time, now that I work from a Laptop at different customers shops I had to "relearn" MCX as I don't want to pack around anything extra, and I am lucky to have a stool to set-up at most customer shops... they could use some 5s....

[Rotary Ninja]

...Here are just a few of mine.

 

I am jealous Jay. I was trying to win an auction last night for a SpaceMouse Pro but I fell asleep LOL. I guess I will just have to buy a new one.

[Joe788]

Can you elaborate abit more

Exactly what do you use it for in mastercam

I use hot keys for speeding things up and often feel I could be doing things a bit faster

 

Moving the model around, especially if you're doing 3D stuff and selecting lots of check and drive surfaces. It's equally valuable in Solidworks when you're adding mates in assemblies. I have my favorite hot keys programmed into the little buttons at the top, and their functions show up on the LCD screen.

 

Years ago I bought a little USB number pad, so I could start entering numbers with my left hand without taking my right hand off the mouse. The Space Pilot kinda phased that out, but I'm finding the number entry to be a bit of a bottleneck these days. I should probably break it back out and swap back and forth between the Space Pilot and the 10 key, since the Pilot is idle while filling out toolpath fields. It'd be cool if bumping the Space Pilot could fully navigate the toolpath trees and data fields, but I don't know how likely that will ever be.

[Mick]

I've got a Space Navigator. It is pretty simplistic, but it works great and gives me all the functionality I need. And I can use it across Solidworks, Vericut, MC and now NX

 

It doesn't have the LCD screen and extra buttons, but it has a nice small footprint. It would be cool if it was wireless though

[BOATDUDEGUY]

Thats awesome that you can program hotkeys into it

[Rotary Ninja]

...It'd be cool if bumping the Space Pilot could fully navigate the toolpath trees and data fields, but I don't know how likely that will ever be.

 

They need to add an optical sensor to the bottom of the SpacePilot and have it activate when a dialog opens up

 

But couldn't you bind a key to the TAB button? It's not ideal, but I use TAB sometimes when on the linking parameters page.

[BOATDUDEGUY]

 

 

after you learn to use one it's like you're holding the model in your left hand

you spin it roll it zoom it pan it whatever without a conscience thought.

 

Another benefit is it takes all the view manipulation work you currently do with your mouse hand

and moves it to your other hand.

If you've been doing this for any number of years, you've got sore fingers, wrists etc ...

Moving half the workload to your other hand is a big deal.

I've known guys who quit this business because it was too painful to work.

A Space Pilot can add years to a carreer that might be ended by carrpal tunnel syndrome.

 

I know the pain

 

 

Boatdudeguy, when you watch me do the webinars you can see me moving the model around and picking real smoothly. this due to use the space unit and the mouse at the same time.I am a key person to. so some time my hand will leave one or the other to hit keys.

 

But like these folks say It drives me crazy to not have one. I now on 5 units my self my wife got me the newer laptop one for Christmas and this little unit is great.

 

Here are just a few of mine.

 

 

I dont think ill be help myself I have to check it out

[Jayson Kramer]

But couldn't you bind a key to the TAB button?

Yes you can.

[BOATDUDEGUY]

Just finally looked up the specs for the space pilot pro on their website

Im totally sold now the thing I love is the view buttons alot of times Ill be hating I have to go all the way up to the tool bars to change views thats fantastic

[Rotary Ninja]

I am wishing for one this Taxmas. I hope Uncle Sam-a-Claus is kind to me this year!

[BOATDUDEGUY]

I am wishing for one this Taxmas. I hope Uncle Sam-a-Claus is kind to me this year!

 

Haha

Good stuff never heard that one

[Machineguy]

I just got the loan of the large 3D connection puck to use. If I like it i will buy the pro mouse.

 

Machineguy

[BOATDUDEGUY]

uncle sam a claus has never been better to me than this yr

 

got my spacepilot pro in this morning and love the programmable keys

 

no more alt edit delete delete entites, just button 1!

the views are at my fingertip instead of hauling the mouse up to the toolbars,

the level manager is a button,

operations manager is another

its got a screen fit button

esc,ctrl,alt,shift,

you can set the buttons for keyboard functions like spacebar and on and on and on

its functions switch to the mastercam ones once mcam opens, its got separate functions on its own just in windows

 

so frikn sweet i cant stand it