Touchscreen MBAs in 2013?

[raptorstv]

Im hoping Apple would release touchscreen retina MBAs this year... Went to Bestbuy and saw a lot of windows8 laptops with touchscreen capabilities. So jealous!

[GGJstudios]

It's very unlikely you'll never see one, as touchscreen on a vertical screen is horrible ergonomics. This has been discussed ad nauseam in this forum.

Will the next Macbook Pro have a touch screen?
touchscreen?
Touch Screen on Next MBP?
Touchscreen iMac - as likely as a refrigerator with toaster
Anybody think a touch screen iMac will be coming soon?
Will there be touch screen on the macbook air?
Next Macbook will be Touch Screen

[Mrbobb]

Jealous?

Well, Mr Spock here don't get all emotional. I actually played with it... the tiles slide just fine as shown on TV but when I started to pinch-zoom it, EEEWWWW! That's horrible for a new OS running on brand new hardware. No need to be jealous.

Tiger, you already got a Swedish Blonde in the house, why are you looking over the fence?

[designs216]

On a productivity machine? Think of all those nasty, distracting finger prints. Jobs would roll over in his grave. Let this particular flash-in-the-pan pass by, no need to participate.

[NutsNGum]

If you've ever touched the screen of a MacBook Air, you'll see that it's not a good idea to touch the screen of a MacBook Air.

[raptorstv]

Apple just need something new! Apple can just make it an option to have: Touchscreen MBA and Non-touchscreen MBA

[kjs862]

I don't think Apple will release a touch screen laptop. They talked about this in one of their product announcements and they decided it was bad ergonomics.

Funny though that Apple makes Smart Cover that prop up iPads. I use my ipad all the time like this and it's very unergonimcal.

[Mrbobb]

Originally Posted by kjs862

Funny though that Apple makes Smart Cover that prop up iPads. I use my ipad all the time like this and it's very unergonimcal.

I held my friend's iPad2 just for a minute, with one hand and I can't believe how heavy just 1.5 LB felt, can't imagine myself doing that for an extended amount of time. They had to have it prop up with something.

[kjs862]

Originally Posted by Mrbobb

I held my friend's iPad2 just for a minute, with one hand and I can't believe how heavy just 1.5 LB felt, can't imagine myself doing that for an extended amount of time. They had to have it prop up with something.

I thought the same of the ipad. I own a mini however that is much better for me.

[raptorstv]

Problem solved with the ipad mini and the upcoming ipad 5 though

[tdhurst]

Why would I want to constantly shift my hands from a flat keyboard to a screen at an angle?

Doesn't an iPad and a BT keyboard already solve this problem?

Besides the novelty, what does a touchscreen laptop do better than what's already available?

[urkel]

Originally Posted by raptorstv

Im hoping Apple would release touchscreen retina MBAs this year... Went to Bestbuy and saw a lot of windows8 laptops with touchscreen capabilities. So jealous!

Its interesting that the best place to talk about a Touch Screen Mac is NOT a Mac forum. Touchscreens are eventually going to get here but, just like with the smaller iPad or larger iPhone, people out here wont "think different" until Apple gives them permission to.

Personally, I dont like Windows 8 but I did have a touchscreen Asus for a few days after the black friday sale before returning it and Touchscreens really are great IF you look at it as an optional input method rather than a primary. Touch isn't replacing anything on a laptop, its adding to it.

[tdhurst]

Originally Posted by urkel

Its interesting that the best place to talk about a Touch Screen Mac is NOT a Mac forum. Touchscreens are eventually going to get here but, just like with the smaller iPad or larger iPhone, people out here wont "think different" until Apple gives them permission to.

Personally, I dont like Windows 8 but I did have a touchscreen Asus for a few days after the black friday sale before returning it and Touchscreens really are great IF you look at it as an optional input method rather than a primary. Touch isn't replacing anything on a laptop, its adding to it.

Why the passive aggressive insult?

Yeah, it adds to the price. Whee.

[rMBP15]

I had a touchscreen HP laptop many years ago. It was only great when you wanna draw mathematical equations.

[JHUFrank]

Negative, wont happen for a long time, unless a radical change in the MBA form.

[deckhart]

Originally Posted by tdhurst

Why would I want to constantly shift my hands from a flat keyboard to a screen at an angle?

Doesn't an iPad and a BT keyboard already solve this problem?

Besides the novelty, what does a touchscreen laptop do better than what's already available?

I have a dell xps12 (win8) and MBA....

After a week using a win8 touchscreen, I find myself wanting to touch all laptop screens to do basic things...its much more natural and useful than you might think.

[Mrbobb]

Originally Posted by deckhart

After a week using a win8 touchscreen, I find myself wanting to touch all laptop screens to do basic things...its much more natural and useful than you might think.

According to Walt Mossberg, who just reviewed Win8 Surface Pro, once you have to drop down to the Win7 desktop to use your current Win Apps, the touch screen metaphor doesn't work good anymore and you have to drop back to the touchpad + mouse, which tells me, they have to upgrade the Apps for a touch interface for it to be truly useful. This may take a little while.

Following this thought, am wholly curious how the upcoming MS Office for IOS will look like.

[theSeb]

Originally Posted by raptorstv

Apple just need something new! Apple can just make it an option to have: Touchscreen MBA and Non-touchscreen MBA

It will be old then and Apple will be seen as a copy cat. They need to do something different and not just copy the stupid idea that windows 8 has implemented. You already have a touch screen - the track pad

[DJLC]

Why would Apple make a touchscreen MacBook when the iPad is around?

The entire reason iOS exists is because Mac OS X (and desktop computing in general) is not designed for a touch interface. This is also a primary reason why they'll never bring Flash to iOS — Flash was designed for PCs with mice. If Apple thought a touchscreen on your computer was a good idea, the iPad would run OS X and be called MacPad (or something).

Touch is a fundamentally different interface. Just like the mouse was in the 80s. That's why Apple's ProDOS fell to the wayside. Touchscreens ARE the future, but it will probably be in the form of a tablet. I'd expect tablets will replace laptops, and desktop PCs will eventually become niche products for developers and creatives.

Microsoft is probably vaguely near the right track with Windows 8 and the touchscreen laptops, but to me it feels like a clumsy fusion of Windows 7 and Windows Phone. It's only going to confuse and infuriate the typical consumer.

[yusukeaoki]

Touch screen computers are gross IMO.

Windows 8 looks better on touch screen because the OS is made for touch screen.
In fact I find it harder to use Win8 on MBP as well.

[iSee]

I used Windows 8 on a touch screen "tablet" style computer for about three weeks. I mostly kept it docked with the bluetooth keyboard in front, though occasionally picked it up.

My impressions using the metro interface:
* it works a lot better than I thought
* reaching out and touching the screen begins to feel natural. It is not fatiguing compared to using a track pad.
* I was switching back and forth between a desktop running W8 and had to catch myself from trying to drag things around with my finger.

My impressions using the classic interface with touch:
* horrible! terrible! I had no mouse for the touch-enabled computer and that drove me nuts when not using the metro interface.

To my mind touch will work great on a laptop, but the OS and apps have to be optimized for touch.

I think before Apple would consider a touch interface on regular OS X, they'd have to revamp the UI of the OS to accomodate. It's a lot more than using iOS-like scroll bars.

And if they keep going strong with the iPad, I just don't see why they would do this. iOS IS the touch-optimized OS. Over time the hardware will get more and more powerful, and there will be less and less reason for Apple to make non-iOS devices.

[entatlrg]

There's not a manufacturer for Windows OS on the planet that can make a notebook with a good trackpad ... hence they're pushing notebooks with touchscreens

[theuserjohnny]

I doubt they'll ever do this. I personally don't like the idea of the hybrid I just don't think it's optimized. If I want a tablet I'll just buy an iPad and if I need a computer I'll buy a computer.

[buysp]

Originally Posted by NutsNGum

If you've ever touched the screen of a MacBook Air, you'll see that it's not a good idea to touch the screen of a MacBook Air.

Touching the glossy screen
It's a retentives cleaning nightmare!
Like me LOL

[PBG4 Dude]

Hasn't intel said that Haswell mobile chips require a touch screen? I've read that more than once now.