Trackpad question - 2011 MBA 11"

[Travisimo]

I have a question about my new 11" MBA. The bottom 4-5mm (slightly less than 1/4") of my trackpad is not responsive to touch sliding. I can still press down there and it will register a click, but my cursor does not move if I slide my finger until I reach about 4-5mm above the bottom edge of the trackpad. The top, left, and right sides seem to be responsive almost all the way to the edges.

Is this normal? It doesn't sound like much of a big deal, but since the trackpad on the 11" is pretty small, I find myself trying to use the 2-finger scroll in web pages and it doesn't always register because one (or both) of my fingers start below this 5mm area.

 

[reputationZed]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_5 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8L1 Safari/6533.18.5)

I havent noticed this yet but I'll check my 13" when I get home.

 

[pil0tflame]

I have a question about my new 11" MBA. The bottom 4-5mm (slightly less than 1/4") of my trackpad is not responsive to touch sliding. I can still press down there and it will register a click, but my cursor does not move if I slide my finger until I reach about 4-5mm above the bottom edge of the trackpad. The top, left, and right sides seem to be responsive almost all the way to the edges.

Is this normal? It doesn't sound like much of a big deal, but since the trackpad on the 11" is pretty small, I find myself trying to use the 2-finger scroll in web pages and it doesn't always register because one (or both) of my fingers start below this 5mm area.

My 2011 13" does the same thing. The bottom edge has about 0.25" of area that doesn't move the mouse cursor. Using a program like BetterTouchTool, I can view a "live preview" of what the trackpad is seeing. It is definitely detecting touches in this lower edge, so it would seem that something within OS X is set to ignore them.

 

[KPOM]

Mine's the same way, and I just checked my mother's 2009 MacBook Pro. It's the same, so it appears to be normal.

 

[Duke15]

Mine is completely responsive, I would take it back if it annoys you

 

[R.OG]

I have noticed this on most macbooks, i don't think its a problem.

 

[cityathrt]

Same issue here, exact same MBA. *shrug* I personally wouldn't bother taking it back for this.

 

[echo.park]

I don't have that issue on my July 2011 MBA.
Mouse movement works on the whole trackpad.

 

[Cynicalone]

Mine does this.

I think it is normal.

 

[kolax]

It's because that area is usually where people rest their thumb. If OS X were to not ignore that small area, then it would assume you were doing 2 finger gestures all the time (which it sometimes does confuse).

It will allow you some movement of the cursor down there if you move one finger alone quickly.

It's a feature and it is meant to be like that.

 

[Obsidiank]

mine does this as well. It's a little annoying because you haven't reached the bottom yet and the mouse stops moving. I've been going to the swipe motion as opposed to the slide.

 

[Jodles]

My 2011 13" does the same thing. The bottom edge has about 0.25" of area that doesn't move the mouse cursor. Using a program like BetterTouchTool, I can view a "live preview" of what the trackpad is seeing. It is definitely detecting touches in this lower edge, so it would seem that something within OS X is set to ignore them.

Same situation here. Maybe it's because they expect the thumb to be there to click the trackpad, so by disabling movement in that part the cursor doesn't inadvertently jump when clicking...

Edit: Just noticed I can do two-finger horizontal swipes here in Safari (Lion), but not 1 finger movement. Definitely seems to be a "feature".

 

[withoutyou]

Just checked. Mine does this too and I don't think it is a problem.

 

[Vantagecb]

My 2008 macbook unibody does this. Probably normal.

 

[3bs]

Never really noticed this so it I guess it doesn't bother me but it's the same on my 2010 11"

 

[hefeglass]

it is SUPPOSED to be like that

my macbook air 13 is the same...all three

its so you people who are used to a trackpad with separate buttons can still use this one like they would use a normal trackpad (one finger to move pointer, thumb to click button at bottom(or nonsensitive area of apple pad).

this is so it won't trip a gesture or something


kilamite said it much better:

It's because that area is usually where people rest their thumb. If OS X were to not ignore that small area, then it would assume you were doing 2 finger gestures all the time (which it sometimes does confuse).

It will allow you some movement of the cursor down there if you move one finger alone quickly.

It's a feature and it is meant to be like that.

 

[Mobius 1]

it happens on 10.6 too

2008 metal macbook :O

 

[Travisimo]

Thanks everyone for replying. It's not a big deal, but I just wanted to make sure there wasn't something wrong with my trackpad.

 

[peskaa]

Same behaviour on my MBA, but also with the stand-alone trackpad connected to my Mac Pro.