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Does your 13" Air behave like this? Trackpad issue

T

tobr

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 31, 2011
4
0
Hi, got my new MacBook Air 13" 2011 less than a week ago. It's great except one thing: the very bottom of the trackpad does not respond that well to my touch.

If I place my finger so that it touches the edge of the trackpad and run the finger left-right back and forth, the cursor does not move at all or at best moves randomly. If I do the same on the left or right or top side of the trackpad, the cursor does move. This only affects the lowest 8-10 mm or so of the trackpad, but it's enough to allow me to keep my finger there comfortably. Very irritating.

I'm not sure if this is expected behavior or not, so does your Air behave like this? I could call up Apple Store to get it replaced, but if I get another unit that behaves the same there is no point. It could be a design problem or it could be a problem with my particular unit.

Thank you, looking forward to your answers.
 
tobr said:
Hi, got my new MacBook Air 13" 2011 less than a week ago. It's great except one thing: the very bottom of the trackpad does not respond that well to my touch.

If I place my finger so that it touches the edge of the trackpad and run the finger left-right back and forth, the cursor does not move at all or at best moves randomly. If I do the same on the left or right or top side of the trackpad, the cursor does move. This only affects the lowest 8-10 mm or so of the trackpad, but it's enough to allow me to keep my finger there comfortably. Very irritating.

I'm not sure if this is expected behavior or not, so does your Air behave like this? I could call up Apple Store to get it replaced, but if I get another unit that behaves the same there is no point. It could be a design problem or it could be a problem with my particular unit.

Thank you, looking forward to your answers.
Click to expand...

Mine doesnt move at all either....

Waiting for responses to see if this is unusual
 
tobr said:
Hi, got my new MacBook Air 13" 2011 less than a week ago. It's great except one thing: the very bottom of the trackpad does not respond that well to my touch.

If I place my finger so that it touches the edge of the trackpad and run the finger left-right back and forth, the cursor does not move at all or at best moves randomly. If I do the same on the left or right or top side of the trackpad, the cursor does move. This only affects the lowest 8-10 mm or so of the trackpad, but it's enough to allow me to keep my finger there comfortably. Very irritating.

I'm not sure if this is expected behavior or not, so does your Air behave like this? I could call up Apple Store to get it replaced, but if I get another unit that behaves the same there is no point. It could be a design problem or it could be a problem with my particular unit.

Thank you, looking forward to your answers.
Click to expand...

I've experienced no problems whatsoever with my trackpad...so judging from my experience there must be something wrong with yours...sorry.
 
If I swipe my finger along the bottom of the trackpad and the top of the palm rest then nothing happens. In other words, touching both the trackpad and palm rest at the same time, sort of 50% each. But, if I move up just a hair so that my finger is entirely on the trackpad then it works fine.
 
Bob Coxner said:
If I swipe my finger along the bottom of the trackpad and the top of the palm rest then nothing happens. In other words, touching both the trackpad and palm rest at the same time, sort of 50% each. But, if I move up just a hair so that my finger is entirely on the trackpad then it works fine.
Click to expand...

Im on my pc atm, will have to try that.

If i start in the middle of the trackpad and drag down to the bottom, then it responds, but from memory if I start at the bottom, it doesnt work. Might take it to the apple store when I get a sleeve :mad:
 
What's frustrating for me is in windows 7 when I try to two finger click to open the copy/paste box I have to do it like 4 times in a row to get it to respond.
 
Just got my 13" Macbook Air the other day as well! :D

My touchpad seems to occasionally have the same problem as yours. It works perfectly fine 100% of the time if I start on the trackpad and then drag my finger down. Then it is about 50% of the time when i start from the bottom and move the cursor around.
 
It's probably an algorithm to help filter out unintentional touches. It's a large touch pad; the likelihood of brushing the pad with your palm, etc is pretty high.
 
Bob Coxner said:
If I swipe my finger along the bottom of the trackpad and the top of the palm rest then nothing happens. In other words, touching both the trackpad and palm rest at the same time, sort of 50% each. But, if I move up just a hair so that my finger is entirely on the trackpad then it works fine.
Click to expand...

Same here. I prefer it this way.
 
My Magic Trackpad on the iMac is the same, the top and left and right sides all work on the edge, the bottom doesn't...

Never noticed it before this post, I generally hit the top of the trackpad more than I hit the bottom :)
 
All my macs (MBA 2011 13", MPB 2011 13", MBP 2009 17" and mini 2009 with magic trackpad) do this. It definitely isn't a hardware problem, I think they do this to avoid unintentional clicks/input when your palm rests on the bottom of the trackpad. It also allows you to leave your thumb at the bottom left so you can move the cursor with your fingers and click with your thumb. I had some problems with BetterTouchTool (a program that lets you assign additional/custom gestures) where it seemed not to have this 'blind spot' and I was endlessly closing apps (I assigned three finger swipe up to quitting all apps) when I was trying to scroll with just two fingers but with my thumb on the bottom left of the trackpad. Very infuriating and I'm sure this is why Apple has incorporated this blindspot.

HTH,

IC
 
Try this interesting experiment. Turn your MacBook upside-down with the top lid on a tablecloth i.e. back of the display on the table and keyboard up in the air. Try using the touchpad now. :confused:

HMMM... revelation. It's to do with the angle of the fingertip relative to the touchpad.
 
i've been having some seemingly random cursor freezes on my MBA 11 and i think it might be related to this subject. my thumb tends to rest either on the bottom part of the trackpad or right off it on the front of the cut out part of the frame. i think sometimes when it hits the bottom of the trackpad and my index finger tries to move the cursor will freeze for a few seconds.
 
Both my 2010 and 2011 mba are like this, and I agree that it is intentional. Your thumb normally rests at the bottom of the clickpad, and you don't want to get spurious inputs from moving your thumb!
 
gloss said:
It's probably an algorithm to help filter out unintentional touches. It's a large touch pad; the likelihood of brushing the pad with your palm, etc is pretty high.
Click to expand...


I concur with your explanation.

The difference between using the touchpad on my mba 11" to my samsung n150 plus, is vast. The mba is significantly superior
 
It's just a matter of touch-sensitivity coupled with corner-click.

Once you have disabled right-click at bottom right corner, it's just a matter of touching the pad "enough" to slide your fingers in that area.

But I'd recommend that you learn how to touch the middle of the trackpad. It shouldn't be that hard.
 
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