You can do an Internet search on this – quite a bit has been written about maintaining a good posture at the computer. You can purchase wrist-rests for both the keyboard and the mouse that help to keep your wrists in a relaxed position. Some people find that a trackball works better for them than a mouse.

As for myself, I trained myself to use the mouse equally well with either my left hand or my right hand (does that make me “ambimousetrous”? ). So when one hand feels strained I just switch to the other for a little while.

You need to fix this problem somehow though, because believe it or not, if it gets worse you could end up needing surgery and a long recovery period to recover full use of your hand again.

A co-worker once told me that “getting old is not for sissies”. I am just now starting to understand what that means…

I know I bothered you for a bit last few months about getting back into playing online. I hadn’t played since the neteller fiasco. But as of a few weeks ago can now direct deposit again out of “poker” bank account, I have started playing online. Serioulsy this time, back in the limit days of 03-04ish I didn’t even have software and legal live poker became available anyway.

Ok, that was just some background. I never enjoyed online like live poker but I’m really getting into it, so, I scanned past articles but didn’t see anything directly to a few questions i have.
Not just for Ed, but anyone out there.

#1. I’m using hold’em manager and mainly just looking at vpip and pfr. What is next important stat I should start to use? ( full-ring player)

#2. I have been 4-tabling from get go. tried 5 & 6 couple times. 1 monitor. Do you guys like stack your windows,scatter them around, or what when you get over 4. I make them smaller for full-time viewing I can’t see them godd enough.

#3. I’m playing FT. their slider seems clumsy to me. Is there a way to keyboard in bet amount or does everyone find it clumsy?

#4. Don’t laugh at me, I’m old. but my wrist is aching some. Can you get carpal from a mouse? Or is it just old motorcylce accidents coming back to haunt me? Do you guys rig anything or whatever for long hours at tables?

that’s it. I know I’ll have more as time goes by. these are mostly physical facility questions. I have made some adjustments, mainly not playing like a lag idiot because each individual table by itself wasn’t as much money as when I play live, but wow does it add up. Probably comes out to more with multi and number hands per hour. Thanks for indulging me guys.

Peace Out

I sound like a Cake poker employee or something. I swear I’m not. I just like the fact that no one there really uses trackers or HUDs.

As a result, I find the competition to be much softer there than when I played on PokerStars and Full Tilt. I think it has less to do with the gamblers moving over to poker from the sportsbook (as many reviews claim) and more to do with the lack of anyone using trackers… other than the extreme few who have found or created some other way to do it.

If you don’t like trackers, get an epassport account and play on Cake. Cake has the exact same rooms and players as Sportsbook, but their customer service is infinitely faster (replies in 10 minutes instead of 2 days) and cashouts are faster and more reliable.

What setup do you have/use? Thanks

I was out at the casino playing live last night,a nd there was this guy who I’ve seen a handful of times out there.. he’s totally lost and hasn’t the slightest idea what to do without PT .. it’s hilarious, and the entire table ran him down, including the wife of one of the guys that had been sitting there all night (who was not experienced enough to play against anyone else)

I started online poker a year ago and have all of the above software but yet am still only playing at the $25NL tables.

All the software mentioned is not going to suddenly make you a better player or give you a big edge over other players. They will certainly save time in table selection if you want to find overly loose or overy aggressive players etc. And it will help multi-tablers to quickly label players as TAG, LAG, rock, etc – but it’s not going to say how good a player they are or how to play against them! They don’t tell you if someone doesn’t know his pot odds, calls raises with junk against two rocks, or has suddenly gone on spew tilt after being sucked out on. I bet Ed could sit at my table and over the course of 20 hands come up with lots of ways of getting my money off me, and none of it will be because over 20k hands I’m running at 20% VPIP and 15% PFR or whatever.

I would even dare say that people will evolve styles (if they haven’t done so already) that will have high VPIPs, PFRs, etc so that non thinking opponents using the software will assume that they’re the fish they’re after when in reality they’re the ones being hunted. How many players are going to be worse off because they’re using the software thinking it’s a silver bullet and they don’t have to think and study anymore?

Multi-tabling has it’s place but isn’t going to help me improve my game beyond getting lots of hands under my belt, which needs to be done to put theory into practice and get a feel for the game. The software can help multi-tabling only so much and you’ve still got to play the players and not their stats.

The biggest benefit of all the software is that it allows detailed analysis and continual improvement of your own game. No longer can you think you’re a winning player because of your selective memory. You can see in black and white which hands are your biggest losers (when I started it was JJ so I realised I had to work at letting it go, now it’s AQ so I come fully awake whenever I’m dealt the dreaded AQ). I know my turn aggression is less than my river aggression which might be an indication of more room for improvement (although what it’s a symptom of I’m not good enough to know yet). It’s all about plugging your biggest leaks and improving your game brick by brick.

Sooo, IMO the software is no substitute for thinking, playing good poker, and continually improving. Their biggest benefit is to help you look at your own game. And if you’re worried about people playing you because they have stats on you, then turn the tables and come up with a way of using that against them. Now that would be good poker wouldn’t it?