Why do trackpads on PC's suck so bad?

[Fingolfin269]

Scrolling with the TrackPoint is actually very, very good. I'm not quite sure what you mean about flipping back and forth, however. The TrackPoint does let you scroll along the entire x/y plane, including diagonal angles.

As for track pads, I do know that the track pads on the ThinkPads are multi-touch capable, but they're nowhere near as smooth or accurate as your 13 inch MacBook Pro. To the average Windows user, they're good. To the average Mac user, they don't "feel right." I hope that makes sense...

Should have been a little more specific there... for flipping back and forth I'm mainly talking about going back/forward in web pages and scrolling up/down. I like some of the other functionality offered but those are the must haves for me at this point.

I know what you mean though in regards to the average Windows user. It's not a negative or anything just a case of not knowing what you're missing if you've never really had it before. I bought this MBP without knowing just how awesome this trackpad is and it was really quite an unexpected and pleasant surprise.

 

[slugg]

I bought this MBP without knowing just how awesome this trackpad is and it was really quite an unexpected and pleasant surprise.

That pretty much sums up my opinion of trackpads as a whole.

1. Apple's are awesome
2. People (generally) don't know what they're missing

I'll check into the back/forward gestures later. I'm stuck in Linux doing some work.

 

[Tom]

I guess I'm one of those people never having used an Apple trackpad. I've probably used trackpads on 20 or 30 Windows devices and like them all to varying degrees.

I do like to use the right edge for vertical scrolling, and usually use the main area for clicks and double-clicks, not so much the buttons. I don't use multi-finger gesturing much, even though it's possible, it just feels awkard.

 

[ther00kie16]

Hope more will try what rabbitz found. He gave some good info in this thread:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2219533

rabbitz' link has a link to following original site with link to download:
http://forum.tabletpcreview.com/hp-...ate-two-finger-scrolling-done-right-more.html

2 finger scroll that actually works; silky smooth I might add. You may need to update Synaptics first. Also, swiping (Synaptics) and multi-clicking(twofingerscroll) work very well, even on my Inspiron 14z, the trackpad of which was given relatively poor reviews compared to that of the Vostro v131 with which the Inspiron 14z shares a good bit of hardware.

Keep in mind that certain functions may be locked out by Synaptics drivers although one can theoretically mod them (I tried but failed).

 

[Fingolfin269]

I forgot I posted in this thread, all of a week ago, so posted another very similar thread (linked in previous post). Getting old.

 

[beginner99]

I found a setting which for me really impoves vertical 1-finger scroll experience (synaptics). In the synaptics driver there is a section called SmartSense. Go to the settings for that sections and there you can set the area where the touchpad registers tpping as left-clicks. make sure it does not overlap with the vertical scroll region.
doing that avoids accidentally selecting web page content or clicking on links when all you want is to scroll. Also i feel scrolling is now better recognized.

This really improved experience a lot!

 

[Medikit]

The non Mac multitouch implementations are crap too. I am firmly in the think pad red knob finger navigation.

 

[Sunburn74]

I have an HP envy from 2010. I love the trackpad. I honestly prefer it to a mouse, and I have some pretty fancy logitech mice at my disposal.

What I have noticed is that reviewers kill windows trackpads for 2 reasons primarily. They say they don't scroll well and they don't pinch to zoom. However, honestly those 2 features don't work well in the windows environment. I don't ever scroll with the trackpad and don't ever pinch to zoom on my laptop. I find the up/down button keys to be much finer control and even on apple machines, the trackpad is sloppy when trying to scroll up and down on a document compared to the button key.

I honestly doubt its a matter of crappy hardware, but more a matter of practice and use. However, reviewers generally give so limited time with products I doubt they really learn how to use the trackpads.

Anyway, long story short, i love my HP envy 14 trackpad.

 

[alkemyst]

When I used to do home-based PC repair most trackpads didn't work right because 1) they had food all in them and 2) they had outdated drivers.

Of course you always get those with a 5-10 year old laptop wanting the tech in a 1-2 year old one.

Trackpads have come a long way...I was an early nub adopter, now trackpad all the way on my laptops unless I can use an external mouse.

 

[ther00kie16]

Yea, twofingerscroll that I linked earlier is awesome. I don't like the sidebar scrolling either as and prefer page up/page down keys (good location a must for me). But the twofingerscroll works great under smooth mode. It's so fluid and natural with invert direction (more natural way of moving pages around) that I sometimes feel awkward going back to the mousewheel because of the choppy feel and reverse orientation.