A good product, that needs a bit better software
For Ahmsville Dial V2 Absolute Variant
I have bought the Dial V2 Absolute Variant and I got it. The springs around the joystick squeek a little, but the device itself works flawlessly. There are a couple of sharp edges around the bigger (bottom) knob, but certainly nothing too bad. The device feels sturdy and stable and is of really decent size.
The software is the bit, that is a little off at the moment. I believe this can be improved. Since I bought this device to tinker with it, not use it for e.g. video production or the likes, it works for me. It could be programmed on a Windows-machine and then probably used on a Mac, but the experience might not be the best as some keys (e.g. CMD/OPTION keys on Mac) cannot be properly mapped on Windows.
Ahmed provides literally a ton of documentation for the device itself and a couple of Git repositories for all the necessary software. The companion app on Windows works, but requires you to have Arduino IDE installed in order to upload the individual profiles, which is not a problem for any kind of developer, but certainly not something a normal user would want to do. Sure, one could argue, that you only have to press the "upload" button in the Arduino IDE, but it still feels unnatural.
The delivery went between several countries and since the shipping from UK, it took me about 4 weeks to actually get my hands on the device. The culprit is the customs service in Germany - they work very slowly.
Which brings me to the last part of this brief review: the price. For a completed product the price would be okay and I am sure this device offers the hardware to compete with a 3D mouse (the absolute variant works wired and wireless and can be charged using USB-C) such as the famous Space Mouse. Due to the open hardware nature of this device you can print almost anything yourself and build and repair it yourself.
Going by the software though (and customs in Germany for packages from the UK), I paid about as much as I'd have paid for a Space Mouse.
Despite the software issue I am rating this as an amazing product, because the hardware (the sensors, the overall device and its capabilities) is exactly as described, open source and very well thought out (love the rotary knobs). Since I am a software engineer myself, I am going to try and improve the firmware of the device and write a suitable driver and perhaps a configuration app. That's when this device will definitely become more useful for any kind of tasks.
Another reason I am rating this product 5 stars, is, that it actually meets all of my expectations. I knew, that the software wasn't perfect and that my platform was not directly supported before I even ordered the device.