I purchased an HP Envy laptop last year and one of my requirements was that it should have a touchscreen. On the whole I like it and probably won’t buy another laptop without one.
It’s not something that I use routinely but just comes in handy every now and then for specific interactions. It’s great for moving icons around, zooming in and out of maps and photos and moving graphical elements. In particular it’s useful if the alternative is a trackpad rather than a mouse.
I had a Chromebook with a touchscreen, and while it was intuitive enough to use, it made the computer as a whole way less durable. Within less than a year, the touchscreen itself stopped working, which wasn’t the end of the world as the rest of the computer was perfectly usable. However, around the 2 year mark, the backlight in the screen stopped working all together, rendering it basically unusable. Plus, the warranty for the Chromebook had expired by then, so I couldn’t even get it repaired.
Of course, that was just my experience. I’m sure other laptops are way more durable.
Pisses me off that Apple, who built a reputation on being user-friendly and tech-savvy, never put a touchscreen on any of their laptops. “Y’all made the iPad, we know you can do it, Apple!”
I’ve got two laptops around right now – a work-supplied Lenovo ThinkPad and my own Dell Inspiron. The ThinkPad has a touchscreen, the Dell doesn’t.
I thought I’d love this feature, and find it useful. Turns out I never use it. Ever. Mostly I just forget it’s there.
I don’t have anything against touchscreens, but I haven’t found a situation yet where it’s a useful feature. Certainly it’s probably better than a trackpad – I hate those things – but I just use a wireless mouse.
The only time my touchscreen has been used has been un-helpful. I designed a set for a musical, and was showing it to the TD, who then promptly leaned in and touched the display and screwed up the presentation. Don’t remember exactly what Steve hit, but it caused an unexpected scrolling.
Take it or leave it. It’s occasionally nice to have, but I found that I was constantly bumping it and inadvertently closing windows. When we moved over to this board I disabled it so I could get mouseover previews. FWIW, you can zoom in and out of maps using the same motion on the trackpad.
rant:
And, regarding the trackpad on the HP Envy, it’s awful. It’ll regularly stop working or stop scrolling or just generally act odd until I tap it (hard) a few times. Of all the ‘fixes’ I’ve read that’s the only one that seems to work which leads me to think it might be a grounding/poor connection issue.
Plus, when I pick the laptop up, it ‘clicks’ the mouse and it always seems to click in a place that causes a problem. I’ve also never had a computer that has deleted so much of what I’ve written. It seems any time I’m writing something my palm will touch the trackpad, highlight everything I’ve written and then the next keystroke wipes it all out.
TLDR, I have a touchscreen but it’s disabled and it’s certainly not a ‘must have’ feature for me when laptop shopping.
I consider it essential, probably because I rarely use my laptop at a desk so it’s a choice between touchscreen or trackpad. It’s also nice for playing simple games.
My work laptop doesn’t have a touchscreen, and I sometimes catch myself tapping something on the screen and wondering why it’s not responding.
My work laptop has a touchscreen. However, it’s also got a small keyboard whereas I have to have a full-size one and a mouse, and an external monitor, so I didn’t even notice it had a touchscreen until one time a fly landed on the screen and I accidentally hit play on a video while swiping it away.
I don’t think I’d use it much. Having the keyboard means that the screen is too far away to be comfortable to regularly scroll up and down on. On my personal laptop I only use the trackpad because it’s so much quicker and easier than even a mouse.