I Hate Typical Laptop Touchpads

I remember when the first touchpads came out. I believe sometime in 1995 was the first time I'd ever seen one. I could be wrong. I may have seen them prior to that, but I know that was first time I'd ever used one. I liked it, and thought it was need. Of course, back then it was a great new idea.

The problem with the touchpad is that it never really changed much. The only things that have changed about them since 1995 is 1.)They are predominantly on laptops now. The first one I tried was a desktop peripheral. 2.)They have different surfaces. Other than that, they are the same device I first tried in 1995. I would even venture to say that some of them aren't as good as the device I tried in 1995.

There is a great exception to this, however. There is one touchpad that truly redefined the touchpad industry. Many of you may be perking up and ready to say "the multi-touch pad by Apple." This was indeed the direction I was heading but there's something important to note. You could buy the multi-touch pad for the PC prior to Apple acquiring the company that first manufactured them.

FingerWorks was the name of the company. The iGesture was the name of the pad. It was a multi-touch gesture pad that could have been great for PC users. It just never took off. It didn't have the right marketing. Thus, Apple now owns the technology and you can no longer buy it for your PC.

The technology went straight into the Macbooks and the iPhone/iPod Touch. You can still buy an iGesture and it may actually be a collectors item one day. A quick browse to here: Fingerworks iGesture Pad shows that it goes for around $1000 on Amazon. That goes to show that they are collectible. The original price was around $100 if I remember correctly.

So, while I had most laptop touchpads, there's one that I love. It's one of the main reasons I just purchased a Macbook Pro. The pointing interface is amazing. I prefer it to a mouse actually. It responds better than any touchpad I've ever used. It mades the touchpad on my Acer look like crap. Don't believe me? Go try one for yourself.