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Horrible Trackpads on Apple Portables - Commonplace??
- Thread starter Ryan1524
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having had experience for many years on mac laptops, i have to say their quality has decreased some. my old 3400 has better control than anything after the clamshell ibook, at least it seems to me. i think some of it is that the texture seems to have changed a bit, it seemed you got a little more friction on the older ones, which was good for finer control, while my fingers glide over the newer ones too easily.
pnw
pnw
Over time, it seems as if the texture has rubbed off of my iBook's trackpad somewhat. The center is almost perfectly smooth. It doesn't seem to have affected tracking, but it feels as if my finger drags a bit on the smooth portion.
haha, I started out on a Toshiba with those "nipple" cursors things, the trackpads ARE better. I used to like the trackballs that the Duos & original PowerBooks had. My old 500Mhz iBook's trackpad got real shinny after 2.5years of use and started acting up a llittle.
actually, i think we all knew this. i sure took it for granted. our problem is that, even after you max out the tracking speed, coming from a PC laptop it's usually still a good bit slower. that's the problem many of these people are having. i certainly felt that way at first, till i got used to it set at max.
a long time ago, apple did have problems with the cursor mysteriously popping up to the left hand corner on top of the screen on old clamshell ibooks
I reckon Shadowfax´analogy to a different car is about right. Just get used to a change.
I can whizz around with the trackpad and click, but not the first time I didnt. It seemed rubbish compared to my PC laptop, but I persevered and am glad I did. And now it is quite funny to see someone else trying it for the first time. The biggest critics are those who are very profficient on their PC laptop, which goes back to the original point. Just because a trackpad is different doesnt mean it is worse.
A default setting is just that, not a "perfect" setting, bear in mind the number of features for people with various disabilities... so go to preferences and change it to suit.
I can whizz around with the trackpad and click, but not the first time I didnt. It seemed rubbish compared to my PC laptop, but I persevered and am glad I did. And now it is quite funny to see someone else trying it for the first time. The biggest critics are those who are very profficient on their PC laptop, which goes back to the original point. Just because a trackpad is different doesnt mean it is worse.
A default setting is just that, not a "perfect" setting, bear in mind the number of features for people with various disabilities... so go to preferences and change it to suit.
i understand that now. but what i hoped was that anyone can get used to it the first time they used it. no 'getting used to' it. just use it, and you can feel right at home.
but then again, it's kinda nice. say a pc lappy user comes in and wants to play with it, they'll probly get frustrated by the trackpad and leave it alone before they can do any damage (if any). this also applies to non apple lappy users.
althou i don't think it's very good for demo units to behave this way. althou it can be (mistakenly) blamed on excessive use, it can act like a deterrent to someone that just wants to 'test-drive' the unit. (me)
Yeah, all I was saying is that the default is HORRIBLY slow, especially in use for demoing to prospective Switchers. Someone coming from the PC will use the OS X default and think "What on earth is wrong with this slow computer?"
At least with the setting all the way up, it stands a chance in the eye of a prospective new Mac purchaser...
There was extensive research done on the usage of a mouse cursor within a GUI, by Xerox PARC, Microsoft, and Apple. What they determined is that in test studies, the faster the mouse cursor goes, the faster the machine is "believed" to be. Microsoft took this direction, sacrificing precision for the "speed" factor. This is part of why PC users seem to think Macs are so much slower--coming from Windows, the Mac cursor does seem to drag...
Other research, however, indicated that such a fast mouse speed was also the source of long-term problems, and that if someone used a "fast" setting exclusively, over time they became unable to accurately click on small items, ie. they lost their ability for precise, tiny motions because all of their activity involved quick sweeping strokes. Therefore Apple went the opposite direction in Systems 1 through 6, making the mouse more precise (and quite a bit slower).
Xerox's test systems, as well as BeOS, used a slightly different adjustment scale that takes some getting used to, regardless of being on Windows or the MacOS. It's really not like either, but it leans more towards the Mac style--it's VERY precise, and usually slow, but it accelerates a bit too quickly for my taste.
In System 7, Apple fine-tuned the adjustment curve to provide quicker movement with longer strokes as well as more precise movement with shorter strokes. This gives the Mac OS one of the most precise cursor movement algorithms on the market, as well as being able to whizz around pretty quickly (though nowhere near as quickly as Windows). The algorithms were again tuned in OS X, and unless my hand deceives me, I believe 10.1 actually changed the cursor movement, but only slightly.
So Windows will always have a faster cursor; it's the way the system is built. However, it's ironic that many of the targets in Windows are so tiny and therefore so hard to acquire (XP window widgets, anyone? What is that, a 1-pixel space between them?), and yet the mouse acceleration is so high... but I guess some things never will make sense. Also the fact that Windows presents multiple menubars in the first place, in a system where it's definitely harder than it should be to hit them (Fitt's Law and all that--the Mac menubar is accessible by slamming the cursor all the way to the top, which is really easy)...
OK, I'll stop now
At least with the setting all the way up, it stands a chance in the eye of a prospective new Mac purchaser...
There was extensive research done on the usage of a mouse cursor within a GUI, by Xerox PARC, Microsoft, and Apple. What they determined is that in test studies, the faster the mouse cursor goes, the faster the machine is "believed" to be. Microsoft took this direction, sacrificing precision for the "speed" factor. This is part of why PC users seem to think Macs are so much slower--coming from Windows, the Mac cursor does seem to drag...
Other research, however, indicated that such a fast mouse speed was also the source of long-term problems, and that if someone used a "fast" setting exclusively, over time they became unable to accurately click on small items, ie. they lost their ability for precise, tiny motions because all of their activity involved quick sweeping strokes. Therefore Apple went the opposite direction in Systems 1 through 6, making the mouse more precise (and quite a bit slower).
Xerox's test systems, as well as BeOS, used a slightly different adjustment scale that takes some getting used to, regardless of being on Windows or the MacOS. It's really not like either, but it leans more towards the Mac style--it's VERY precise, and usually slow, but it accelerates a bit too quickly for my taste.
In System 7, Apple fine-tuned the adjustment curve to provide quicker movement with longer strokes as well as more precise movement with shorter strokes. This gives the Mac OS one of the most precise cursor movement algorithms on the market, as well as being able to whizz around pretty quickly (though nowhere near as quickly as Windows). The algorithms were again tuned in OS X, and unless my hand deceives me, I believe 10.1 actually changed the cursor movement, but only slightly.
So Windows will always have a faster cursor; it's the way the system is built. However, it's ironic that many of the targets in Windows are so tiny and therefore so hard to acquire (XP window widgets, anyone? What is that, a 1-pixel space between them?
), and yet the mouse acceleration is so high... but I guess some things never will make sense. Also the fact that Windows presents multiple menubars in the first place, in a system where it's definitely harder than it should be to hit them (Fitt's Law and all that--the Mac menubar is accessible by slamming the cursor all the way to the top, which is really easy)...OK, I'll stop now
maybe they should use a faster movement as default to help with those demo stores and an 'enhanced' and more accurate scanning mode for people who wants it. but then the more advanced function woudn't be default and it won't be apple's signature of quality anymore.