I literally just want a touchpad with buttons. These new 'clickpads' are the bane of my existence. They are so much slower, and certain workflows are impossible. I must use an external mouse now with modern laptops.
Why can no laptop manufacturer even make this an option?
Aside: what if frame.work site had a place for popular vote for features? (With proper registration, etc.) E.g. Digital Ocean has this, and it seems helpful, they follow up on some of the most upvoted feature requests.
It's sort of free market research.
Can only speak for myself, but for me the issue with traditional clickpads comes down to their mechanical diving board nature. Even the best ones are not nice to use due to the unavoidable variance in pressure and click feel across the pad that is exacerbated as the size of the pad increases and the mechanism wears over time.
The type that doesn’t move at all and simulates a click with haptics on the other hand I find just fine. MacBooks do this of course but there’s also a few x86 laptops equipped with pads like that.
So in my opinion, mechanical clickpads should disappear entirely and laptops should offer two options: a static haptic clickpad and traditional trackpad with buttons.
Honestly, I'm here half wondering why we need the click at all. One finger drag for move, quick one finger tap for left click, tap and half for click and drag, two finger tap, two finger drag for scroll covers all the common interactions.
Which isn't to say I don't use the click functionality at all. I will subconciously use it in some scenarios, but not in others, but if it were missing I would adapt very quickly, since I use the gesture alternatives so often, that I would automatically fall back to them.
I suppose I need the click for some obscure interactions like right click drag, but honestly except in games I've almost never seen that used. My surface laptop as currently configured literally wouldn't even allow some other rare ones like hold button and scroll (I'd need to turn on right side scroll-wheel for that) and I've never even noticed the absence of that ability until I tried it just now.
I've missed them every time I've been in the unfortunate position of dealing with someone else's macOS system. It's all a matter of what you're accustomed to.
I assume some gestures are simply not possible. Like click-to-drag and scroll simultaneously. Not every app handles gutter-hover-to-scroll in a usable way. On a mouse or a pad with buttons, you can keep the left click held down and scroll with the wheel or gesture. Uni-pads make this impossible.
> Why can no laptop manufacturer even make this an option?
Because it’s a variation of both the case and the internals that brings a higher failure rate, more dust ingress, more moving parts, and, most importantly, would rarely be chosen.
> They are so much slower,
They are objectively faster because you can click anywhere rather than moving a finger to a button or keeping one finger always on the button.
> They are objectively faster because you can click anywhere rather than moving a finger to a button or keeping one finger always on the button.
I have no problem with the current trackpad (and prefer it), but when I used a trackpad with dedicated buttons, i'd use my index finger to track and my thumb to click, so I wouldn't have to move my fingers around at all.
Regardless, why do we feel the need to argue with people's personal preferences? You don't have to agree with someone on this. It's fine. People can prefer other things.
Someone should scoop up the niche market of anguished ThinkPad devotees, with a TrackPoint and a good, non-chiclet keyboard. Maybe Framework, leveraging its modular system. Maybe a Framework-compatible third-party.
Some Dell business models have them as well... I used to be a fan, but at this point I prefer the Mac touchpad experience. The closest I've felt are Razor and a few higher end Chromebooks (that I won' t buy). I'm hoping other mfgs get a lot closer to the Apple touchpad experience as patents start to expire in the next few years.
There's a few that are close, but still not close enough. Also, Mac slightly changed their default settings (regarding the physical click behavior), I never recall what it is but only that I change it back when starting out on a new machine.
With the trackpads that have built-in clicks in the pad itself, I've always found it really difficult to drag-and-drop stuff if it has to be pulled longer than a few pixels. Just moving and pressing against a surface seems to not be a super accurate movement in general.
While I prefer an external mouse, I can manage ECAD and some 3D modelling if I have buttons. It's great in a pinch. I'm getting nauseous even imagining it with a clickpad.
My current plan is to retrofit buttons to my clickpad. Earlier this week I ordered a few different styles of touchpad buttons from AliExpress to test. I'll build a custom little USB HID device for it once I've picked my favourite one.
I don't think I can rely on laptop manufacturers to buck the clickpad trend any time soon, so I'll do it myself.
> These new 'clickpads' are the bane of my existence.
But only because they are all worse than Apple's version. What you really want isn't a touchpad with buttons, is a "clickpad" that doesn't suck. And as far as I know only Apple makes them.
nrp|6 months ago
JoshTriplett|6 months ago
How might we go about registering the quantity of that demand?
nine_k|6 months ago
cosmic_cheese|6 months ago
The type that doesn’t move at all and simulates a click with haptics on the other hand I find just fine. MacBooks do this of course but there’s also a few x86 laptops equipped with pads like that.
So in my opinion, mechanical clickpads should disappear entirely and laptops should offer two options: a static haptic clickpad and traditional trackpad with buttons.
jsmith45|6 months ago
Which isn't to say I don't use the click functionality at all. I will subconciously use it in some scenarios, but not in others, but if it were missing I would adapt very quickly, since I use the gesture alternatives so often, that I would automatically fall back to them.
I suppose I need the click for some obscure interactions like right click drag, but honestly except in games I've almost never seen that used. My surface laptop as currently configured literally wouldn't even allow some other rare ones like hold button and scroll (I'd need to turn on right side scroll-wheel for that) and I've never even noticed the absence of that ability until I tried it just now.
iknowstuff|6 months ago
How are they slower/impossible?
JoshTriplett|6 months ago
ksec|6 months ago
jayd16|6 months ago
aaomidi|6 months ago
Aurornis|6 months ago
Because it’s a variation of both the case and the internals that brings a higher failure rate, more dust ingress, more moving parts, and, most importantly, would rarely be chosen.
> They are so much slower,
They are objectively faster because you can click anywhere rather than moving a finger to a button or keeping one finger always on the button.
kelnos|6 months ago
I have no problem with the current trackpad (and prefer it), but when I used a trackpad with dedicated buttons, i'd use my index finger to track and my thumb to click, so I wouldn't have to move my fingers around at all.
Regardless, why do we feel the need to argue with people's personal preferences? You don't have to agree with someone on this. It's fine. People can prefer other things.
MobiusHorizons|6 months ago
rootnod3|6 months ago
soperj|6 months ago
neilv|6 months ago
https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadp/th...
Someone should scoop up the niche market of anguished ThinkPad devotees, with a TrackPoint and a good, non-chiclet keyboard. Maybe Framework, leveraging its modular system. Maybe a Framework-compatible third-party.
tracker1|6 months ago
There's a few that are close, but still not close enough. Also, Mac slightly changed their default settings (regarding the physical click behavior), I never recall what it is but only that I change it back when starting out on a new machine.
SoftTalker|6 months ago
rustyminnow|6 months ago
JoshTriplett|6 months ago
criddell|6 months ago
diggan|6 months ago
Deuter8|6 months ago
gloxkiqcza|6 months ago
Deuter8|6 months ago
I don't think I can rely on laptop manufacturers to buck the clickpad trend any time soon, so I'll do it myself.
IshKebab|6 months ago
But only because they are all worse than Apple's version. What you really want isn't a touchpad with buttons, is a "clickpad" that doesn't suck. And as far as I know only Apple makes them.
dismalaf|6 months ago