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Comment by spongle | Hacker News Reader

I'd have agreed with you once, but I broke the trackpad on a ThinkPad a couple of years ago and out of apathy i switched to the nipple mouse and I haven't looked back. It takes more practice but it has excellent precision and infinite movement. The trackpad remains broken and unplugged.

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I've had several ThinkPads, and I've always disabled the trackpad in the BIOS as soon as I got a new one - it's totally unnecessary when you have the TrackPoint. It's so much faster and more precise. Like amalcon said, I have no idea how anyone can use a trackpad. Whenever I watch a friend use one, or use one myself, it's like the mouse is moving in slow motion compared to me using the TrackPoint. It does take some practice, but it's well worth the investment, just like how learning to touch type pays off in the long run.

How do you scroll? Do use scroll bars?

Hold the middle button and use the nipple. It scrolls like a mousewheel.

On thinkpads you can press the middle mouse button (below the spacebar) then press the trackpoint up or down.

I have always usually done this, but also remapped the trackpad to be entirely a "scrollpad"

> On thinkpads you can press the middle mouse button (below the spacebar) then press the trackpoint up or down.

Yep, and you can also click and release the middle mouse button, then separately mouse up or down. Interestingly, I have only been able to get either this OR the press then scroll behavior you described working on Windows (by toggling a setting), but in Linux you can have both enabled at the same time.

Bizarrely, Linux seems to support much of the trackpoint/trackpad stuff on thinkpads better than Windows does. I use to not be able to configure the trackpad how I wanted on Windows, but the Synaptics driver for Linux gave me plenty of possibilities.

I use the arrow keys.

Pretty good solution actually as well. Older ThinkPad keyboards have back and forward keys next to the arrows as well.

I have a T61 thinkpad, and love it. I use Linux on it solely. I have compiz bound to those forward and back arrows as cube_rotate_left and right. And I also run 8 desktops. Makes my world so much simpler in terms of organization of programs and flow.

Fellow T61er on Linux chiming in. A thousand MBAs couldn't tear me away.

Nice idea. So going to do that on my spare T61 later :)

Trackpoint is great, but I've been trying to move away from its use. I've found after frequent use, my finger tip gets irritated- I suspect mechanics similar to the development of a blister are at play- and they haven't been good for my hand overall. I've forced myself to use trackpads and mice now, because they are much lower impact on my hand. I can keep my hand completely relaxed when using a trackpad.

Have you tried changing the cap? I exclusively use the concave "soft rim" cap (http://support.lenovo.com/ContentResources/Migrated%20Assets...).

It helped, but did not solve.

Furthermore, it is a hell of a lot easier to play quake with a trackpoint than a trackpad.

I have to guess that these trackpads will act like joysticks for fpsen. Keep your finger on the left side to move left, etc. Maybe I'm wrong though.

I was assuming the opposite. Keyboard and Mouse is usually regarded as superior to joysticks for FPS so I assumed they were trying to bridge the gap and come up with something more mouse-like?

Yes, in fact it would solve the aiming issue, while using the left trackpad in "joystick mode" would better replicate a keyboard.

If it were me doing it, I would use the trackpad and the trackpad buttons. (I'm not sure, but I believe each trackpad is "pressable" and has multiple buttons, replicating a d-pad)

I would tap and drag for little and precise movements, swipe for fast movements, and press the button for default movement. With some training, it can become pretty natural.

You'll hopefully be able to choose based on preference, since choice seems to be the theme here.

Use an Apple trackpad and you'll never want to use the ThinkPad/Lenovo eraser nubs ever again.

I have, and I strongly prefer the TrackPoint--by a whole order of magnitude. I never have to keep my fingers off home row.

I do use a tiling window manager and bindings like Vrome/Vimperator, so my use case is probably atypical. My mouse usage is limited to when I deem it absolutely necessary; I hate physical/mental context switching, and bringing my hand from keyboard to TrackPad/mouse/whatever is a huge context switch.

But that's really a matter of where the trackpoint is, not the input on the device itself. It's a bit different while you're playing games.

I have always felt that the TrackPoint (on a HP Elitebook here) is difficult to access from the right or left index because of its place between G and H.

I would use it so much more if it was between H and J.

How do you stretch your finger towards the middle of the keyboard with no issue? Stretching just to type a letter is fine for me (think Y, H or B), but staying on the TrackPoint is hard.

I used an Apple one (one of the large ones) on a 2010 MBP. It was error prone and made my fingers numb after a while. Not only that, the full pad depression to click is awkward and configuring sensitivity for tap to click was never just right.

Possibly a shocking statement here but I went from a top end 2010 MBP to a 2009 T400 running windows 7 and am much happier as a whole, even though I have my head in UNIX machines a lot.

Not my experience at all. Apple trackpads tire my fingertips, they become sore after extended usage.

Strongly disagree. If you're just browsing or clicking on things, sure, the Apple trackpad is great. For playing games, the trackpoint is better. For coding or doing any sort of mixture of typing/pointing, the trackpoint is better.

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