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Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

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Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#31

Post by nsonha »

DoingIsLearning wrote: post #14

Not everyone will value a touchpad or touchpad functionality the way you do. I can give you my use case as anecdata: The instances I am using a work laptop I am using it at a desk not on my actual lap. I will use the keyboard as much as possible and on the scenario that I am frequently using a mouse input I will make use of a vertical mouse to mitigate RSI. My casual usage of a touchpad will probably be in the minute…

Vertical mouse mitigates pronation, it doesn't mitigate RSI. Shouldn't you prefer touchpad if RSI is a concern? It gives your wrist and fingers more articulation, as opposed to any kind of mouse where the wrist is fixed.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#32

Post by lucideer »

emrex wrote: post #25

In my opinion the problem is not always the touchpad(hardware) there are a lot of great ones. The problem relies on the driver integration with the os especially the interface. The animation and precision is so smooth in macos that at least makes Me think this hardware is far betteter then others.

Drivers may cause issues in some cases but I'm using a Magic Trackpad 2 with Linux on a Dell laptop, and the problem is definitely the hardware. The external trackpad works flawlessly, the built in one is terrible.

It could still of course be drivers I guess, but it would be a bit odd if it were in this particular case.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#33

Post by lucideer »

flohofwoe wrote: post #5
__warlord__ wrote: post #3

Is not "light years ahead" of __all__ manufacturers, just the cheap ones. Surface laptop trackpads are on par with Apple ones.

Also, I bet most of the Apple touchpad magic actually lies in the software. For instance the touchpad on an MBP doesn't feel all that great anymore under Linux (not a dig against Linux, it's just that writing universal touchpad drivers doesn't appear to be a simple and straightforward task).

I haven't used Linux on a MBP but I use a Magic Trackpad 2 with my Dell Linux laptop and the external apple pad is light years ahead of the built in Dell one (brand new Dell Precision so hardware age is no excuse)

Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#34

Post by lucideer »

mhitza wrote: post #28

Can someone ELI5 what's so special about the Mac's touchpad? It's been a good couple of years since I've used a MacBook and I don't recall anything in particular standing out for me about their touchpad.

The usability and responsiveness is just much better. You kind of have to just use it yourself for an extended period and experience the difference.

There may be someone in these comments able to breakdown the exact detailed technological "why" of the superior user experience but in general I don't think this is a very "ELI5" type topic; it's more about experience.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#35

Post by htk »

I see it as a mix of hardware and software, but mostly software.

Hardware: -Large touchpads, enabled by great palm rejection -Haptic Feedback instead of physical clicks, letting you click anywhere

Software: -start a gesture and the ui begins responding to it. It feels like you’re directly manipulating what’s on the screen. On other OSs they detect the gesture way too late so the feeling is broken. -small details like scroll inertia are really smooth and present all over the OS, refining the overall experience

Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#36

Post by pjerem »

I'd say it's the OS, and the drivers.

I do use a Magic Trackpad 2 with Precision drivers on Windows 10 and ... it's as sluggish as my laptop native touchpad. Gestures barely makes senses, it's lagging everywhere, while the same device on OSX allow smooth-as-butter(tm) interactions.

I also found that OSX drivers have a nicer palm rejection feature where on Windows I frequently click with the palm of my hand.

I had an interesting experience with the very latest Fedora/Gnome versions with the Magic Trackpad letting me guess that an important step towards good gestures support on linux is on the way.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#37

Post by GuB-42 »

It might change, unless Apple does something new.

Here is a video by LinusTechTips about a new touchpad by Sensel that uses pressure sensors https://youtu.be/XuM2ZG_Hwjk It will be used in the ThinkPad X1 Titanium.

In the same video Linus basically says that capacitive touchpad are nonlinear and hard to get right, and Apple spends a lot of resources in fine tuning, more that anyone else.

I will not call LinusTechTips an authoritative source but to my knowledge, for now, that's the best we have.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#39

Post by mattbrewsbytes »

This is a good example of "take my money" features where the value and experience of the feature far outweigh any notions of "open source" or things like that.

There are those that dislike the closed ecosystem of Apple but for me the features and seamless integration of their products far exceeds my desires for that. I would like more easily replaceable parts like batteries and drives but those are once every few years types of things vs. everyday use of a touchpad.

Re: Ask HN: Why is the touchpad on MacBooks still ahead of other manufacturers?

#40

Post by smallstepforman »

pjerem wrote: post #36

I'd say it's the OS, and the drivers. I do use a Magic Trackpad 2 with Precision drivers on Windows 10 and ... it's as sluggish as my laptop native touchpad. Gestures barely makes senses, it's lagging everywhere, while the same device on OSX allow smooth-as-butter(tm) interactions. I also found that OSX drivers have a nicer palm rejection feature where on Windows I frequently click with the palm of my hand. I had an…

I use MacBook Pro 11.3 (mid 2014) with Haiku OS, there are no device specific drivers for that OS, and it behaves the same as OSX. It’s most likely the firmware which exports a generic HID which does the “mapping”.
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