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Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

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Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#141

Post by mitchty »

overgard wrote: post #68
quinndupont wrote: post #52

In no way am I trying to incite Mac vs. PC, but after years of Apple laptops I grew bored with their aluminum fascism and decided (last year) to buy a top-of-the-line Thinkpad. A couple of months later, taking a huge economic hit, I sold the Thinkpad and returned to Apple. I simply could not handle the trackpad (and I gave up on the weird Thinkpad nubbin back in the early 2000s). I quite literally felt like I had a d…

I don't know that apple gets this right either. (I have a macbook). The actual tracking feels fantastic and precise, and it has a nice texture, but I /hate/ how they refuse to put real buttons below it. Things like "right mouse drag" which I use all the time become a nightmare, and the whole "no buttons" thing just seems like it's putting aesthetics over functionality.

What do you use right click drag for on OS X?

I have double tap set to right click and never really have issues. Then again I normally run a browser/terminal/emacs as my main apps so I don't really need/use right click at all that often.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#142

Post by eddiedunn »

Just put Linux on it. Seriously.

My sister and I have the same Zenbook, and while my trackpad runs like a dream in Elementary OS, her trackpad is among the worst I've ever had the displeasure of using on a laptop -- and this is solely due to the shitty Windows drivers.

She's been nagging me to put Linux on her computer as well, and once Freyja is released, I will.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#143

Post by cowabunga »

Moru wrote: post #138
cowabunga wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ex Mac user and now ThinkPad user here. The MBP pad makes my fingers sore after a couple of hours as the surface is slightly abrasive. The Apple wireless mouse thing nips my fingers when I press it giving me sore fingers plus it weighs and ton and the gestures make my wrist hurt. The ThinkPad nipple mouse works pretty well as it's in the home row but my hands ache after a couple of hours. The trackpad on the ThinkPad…

I would never buy a mouse without a back button. It's a wonder they still make those.

I have back/forward keys on my keyboard and tend to use them instead of the mouse.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#144

Post by rsynnott »

quinndupont wrote: post #52

In no way am I trying to incite Mac vs. PC, but after years of Apple laptops I grew bored with their aluminum fascism and decided (last year) to buy a top-of-the-line Thinkpad. A couple of months later, taking a huge economic hit, I sold the Thinkpad and returned to Apple. I simply could not handle the trackpad (and I gave up on the weird Thinkpad nubbin back in the early 2000s). I quite literally felt like I had a d…

> I grew bored with their aluminum fascism

Oh, THAT'S what happened to the titanium Powerbook; another victim of Metal Eugenics.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#145

Post by wtallis »

frozenport wrote: post #132
wtallis wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, all of those features tend to result in machines that stretch the definition of laptop and usually land themselves into what used to be called "luggables". Even Apple's 17" MacBook Pro was 6.6 pounds and 15.5 inches wide, and if you triple the TDP of the GPU, double the number of memory slots, and increase the battery and cooling proportionately you've got something that can only be transported wit…

You sound like a wimp! I have never had a problem fitting my Asus ROG laptop in my backpack. I got raid ssds, 32 gigs of ram and a 770 GPU. I can do my work from anywhere.

Anywhere with an outlet.

Looking at the current Asus ROG 17" laptops, it looks like they've got a model that's only 7.5 pounds with a battery the same size as in the MacBook Air 13". Or you can get a 10.5 pound machine that's got a battery the size of what's in current 15" MacBook Pros and was in the 17" MBPs. And most of those manage to stay less than 2" thick, but they're all at least twice as thick as a current MBP. All in all, they've got almost as much in common with an iMac as with a MacBook Pro. (Seriously: the 21.5" iMac is only 2 pounds heavier.)

10 pounds of textbooks in a backpack is regarded as a public health problem. 10 pounds of computer cannot be taken seriously as something made for use on the go. We really do need some more specific terminology to draw distinctions between the different classes of hinged computers.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#146

Post by wtallis »

manachar wrote: post #134
krick wrote: post #50

So, really, is there anything left to buy except MacBooks anymore? I'm not a big fan of Apple, and would have to go through all sorts of nuisances to install Linux on it anyway, but the longer I search for solid 13" laptop, the more horrified I become. It cannot be that nobody makes nice laptops, can it?

The market is weird about laptops right now. Basically, it seems that Apple is the only one still making a profit off of them. Maybe PCs bet to heavily on netbooks?

They definitely did bet too heavily on netbooks, but that market has long since crashed. Chromebooks picked up a significant chunk of what was left in that segment. The more recent trend has been Intel's push for "ultrabooks", initially spurred by their desire to have a Wintel competitor to the MacBook Air. It hasn't been as disastrous as the netbook fad, but almost everything that superficially appears to be competition cuts corners in big ways and ends up being cheaper but a lot crappier and also basically unprofitable.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#147

Post by mbq »

tdicola wrote: post #45
rquirk wrote: post #6

Would this all be fixed by installing a linux distro on the laptop? A different trackpad driver - if it works ;) - would do different stuff, and remapping media keys is possible in most desktop environments.

It's a gamble though, in my experience Linux support for native device power management is very spotty. You might trade a crappy trackpad driver for no sleep, no CPU throttling, etc.

Not really a gamble -- you usually can find reliable info about Linux support on the internet, provided that the device is not too exotic.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#148

Post by pyk »

quinndupont wrote: post #94
klibertp wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In no way am I trying to incite Mac vs. PC Oh, but you're doing it anyway. Whatever, sounds like fun! ;) > I quite literally felt like I had a degenerative neuromuscular disease when I used the trackpad [EDIT: I should mention that I'm using almost exclusively keyboard for interacting with my computers, so I may be missing some obvious things.] I'm using mac book pro and some hp notebook (both a year and a half old…

I tried ALL of the internal Lenovo-supplied utilities, and even "upgraded" to a generic driver provided by Synaptics (maker of the trackpad hardware). Moving the mouse cursor around the screen was usually not a problem, but scrolling and click-and-drag (to say, move a file using the GUI) would only actually work about 70% of the time. Instead of scrolling it would stutter and zing about, and instead of click and drag…

There have been some really really awful Lenovo Thinkpad trackpads in the last 2-3 years -- one specific one that I have used that you see a TON of complaints about was the X230 trackpad (google it, it's a mess). One of the worst I have ever used, with no amount of adjustment that can fix it -- Lenovo really dropped the ball when cutting costs. The worst part was that the X220/T420 and plenty of other older models had perfect trackpads.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#149

Post by jarin »

bobbles wrote: post #135
archagon wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think trackpads on new Macbooks tend to be a little sticky until they smooth out over a week or two.

Brand new iPhones have this same sensation

This might sound kind of dumb, but just rub it on your face. I'm pretty sure the "smoothing out" is just getting a nice thin coating of oil on it, like seasoning a cast iron pan.

Re: Why Asus trackpad driver sets the CPU speed at maximum during scroll

#150

Post by krrrh »

overgard wrote: post #68
quinndupont wrote: post #52

In no way am I trying to incite Mac vs. PC, but after years of Apple laptops I grew bored with their aluminum fascism and decided (last year) to buy a top-of-the-line Thinkpad. A couple of months later, taking a huge economic hit, I sold the Thinkpad and returned to Apple. I simply could not handle the trackpad (and I gave up on the weird Thinkpad nubbin back in the early 2000s). I quite literally felt like I had a d…

I don't know that apple gets this right either. (I have a macbook). The actual tracking feels fantastic and precise, and it has a nice texture, but I /hate/ how they refuse to put real buttons below it. Things like "right mouse drag" which I use all the time become a nightmare, and the whole "no buttons" thing just seems like it's putting aesthetics over functionality.

To me two-finger tap is a natural action for "right click" or context.

Three-finger drag (which isn't on by default) is one of the best things about using a Mac imo. I honestly don't know how people live without on any platform. It's a huge improvement over double-tap-lock-and-drag or whatever the old way is.

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