For Xmas, my mom has offered to buy me a new laptop in exchange for my old desktop. I want a laptop so it will be easier to transport, but I don’t like touchpads. I know they used to make laptops without touchpads; I’ve seen models where the keyboard goes right down to the edge of the computer. Is there any laptop currently on the market that does not have a touchpad? Bonus points if it has a widescreen monitor and an Athlon processor.
friend continuity error:
my vintage ibm thinkpad has an eraserhead device rather than a touch pad
lh
You might be better off getting her a regular notebook (with touchpad) and then getting a a good wireless (or wired) keyboard and mouse. Much better than hunching over a notebook to type and mouse, whether it has touchpad or not.
As a side benefit when I go to sell my notebook after 2-3 years of use I can get absolute top dollar on resale because it literally is “untouched”.
As someone else menitoned, thinkpads did, and still do have trackpoints. A few other brands do as well. It’s one of the main reasons why I bought a thinkpad. I HATE touchpads with a passion. I hate using them, I hate my palm touching it while I’m typing. I just plain don’t like them. I do however LOVE trackpoints, but no one else seems to.
I have a Toshiba notebook. I bought a Microsoft Optical USB Wheel Mouse with Intellipoint software which allowed me to shut off the touchpad.
I see the newer IBM Thinkpads have both Trackpoint and touchpad. I would assume the touchpad can be disabled, but does anyone know for sure? (I love trackpoints, I even have a desktop keyboard with one.)
As for the keyboard extending to the front of the notebook, I haven’t seen those in a while. On most notebooks the display (and hence the case) is much larger than the keyboard. And placing the keyboard further back does improve ergonomics, IMHO.
I have an HP model like this. While I could go into the device manager and disable it, I don’t, because it let me set it up so a tap in a certain place on the touchpad was equal to a middle-button click, and I can rub my finger up and down the left edge to scroll. Otherwise, I use the Trackpoint (which I’ve always heard referred to as the g-spot mouse, since it’s next to the letter g).
-lv
Yeah, I might have to go with a laptop that has a touchpad and just disable it. Though what I really don’t like is having to put my wrists on the computer while I’m typing, it’s sort of uncomfortable. I do have extra keyboards, though, so I can just use one of those when I’m at home.
And I really don’t like trackpoints. I’m so used to having a mouse.
I’m a big fan of the mid/late 90s laptops that had the built in trackball with l/r buttons. I used to use a trackball mouse and at the time the trackball built into the notebook was very useful to me.
I hate touchpads, touchpoints are better. Buying a simple USB mouse better still.
On an older Dell Latitude, I was able to enter the BIOS upon boot and disable the built-in trackpoint/touchpad pointing devices in favor of a serial port mouse. (I think the same option was available for PS/2 mice, but in any case you could always use a USB mouse with the setting I chose.) Not only are the trackpoint/touchpad both less comfortable to use, on the laptop I used they also seemed to be jammed, accelerating the on-screen pointer to one corner of the display even when no finger pressure was applied to either trackpoint or touchpad.
Although Dell’s BIOS is probably not identical to those found in IBM Thinkpads, I would be surprised not to find a similar option in the latter.
This is the David Lynch model?
it is a thinkpad 770. 133 pentium with a 5 gig hard drive. when i got it the operating system was windows 95. i upgraded it to windows 98 se so i could use an optical usb mouse rather than the trackpoint.
the fire alarm systems i program and maintain are operated by an ascii database. an operating system newer than 98se will not support the programming needed to run these alarm systems.
lh
Okay, nevermind humor today.
I have use of one of these at work, and I HATE it. Both the eraser thingee and the Touchpad are always live, and the Pad is always interfering with the eraser thingee, because my hand is always brushing against the pad when I use the eraser. I don’t have admonistrative rights to change anything about the setup, so I’m stuck using the pad, because when I use it I’m not inadvertently activating the eraser control (which is of course the one I would prefer to use.
However, if you can disable one or the other device, and I don’t know whether you can, the Thinkpad would be a very good choice.
An aside – I handle lots and lots of laptop computers at my job, which includes setting up Powerpoint presentations for visiting academics. Thinkpads are far better at this task than any others, especially Dells. I never have problems getting the video output of Thinkpads up on a big screen through data projectors, but I am almost guaranteed to have a difficult time with Dells. So if you might carry this thing around to do presentations, absolutely go with the IBM.
Math geeks making nuanced little jokes? It’s the end times.
HEY!
I’m also a film geek, a philosophy (well, metaphysics) geek, a theology (well, eschatology) geek, a Tolkien geek…
How does anyone have any problems wiht their palms hitting the trackpad? The only way I can even get my hands to brush up against it makes typing impossible because my hands are in such a weird position…
Speaking of Tolkein, I got an Evenstar Pendant from my husband for Christmas. Wheeeeee! 
It’s when I’m trying to use the eraser-point mouse control on the Thinkpad, which is right in the middle of keypad. The Touchpad is centered underneath the keypad. So when I’m using my index or center finger on the eraser head, the bottom of my hand and wrist are brushing around the Touchpad. I find the flesh below my thumb is the most frequent offender.
Oh. I don’t have that. Just a touchpad.