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Push it... push it real good...

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The other day I got a chance to play with the new Apple force touch trackpad. This is a new design that Apple has put on their laptops for non-mechanized clicking on trackpad. When you press on the trackpad it senses the force that you're pressing with, and when you reach a certain level, you feel a 'click'. If you keep pressing, you feel a second 'click'. The unique thing is that these 'clicks' aren't physical in nature. The trackpad never moves at all, but the click that you feel is from haptic feedback. In essence, when you press with enough force, the trackpad clicks back at you. You feel the sensation of clicking, but it's simply the trackpad responding to your pressure.

I got to play with this for a while, since the Apple Store rep was talking with us about soccer, and after a short bit I was getting the hang of it. I feel that it would take quite a bit longer though to really feel comfortable with this new paradigm. I'm someone who has a hard time with trackpads in general, not really preferring them to a good old fashioned mouse. I've gotten more accustomed to them over the years, but still feel like I don't have quite the same measure of control. For example on the Lenovo that I use at work, the trackpad has the buttons mechanically built into the pad. What happens more often than not, is that I can't locate the right spot to get a right-click vs a left click. This might just be poor design on the part of Lenovo, but it's something that I never struggle with on a real mouse.

Now that I've played with the new trackpad I'm anxious to try the new Apple Mac Book. One of my favorite MacBooks that I've ever owned was the 12 inch model, so I can't wait to see how this new one feels.

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