Laptop touch screen, can you share your experiences?

lucacerone · 2014-09-11 16:52:03

Hi everybody,
I would like to buy a new laptop and am considering about buying one of those that works
both as a normal laptop or as a 10" tablet, i.e. you can "unplug" the monitor from the keyboard.

I was wondering, does Arch support well touch screen?
Do you have Arch on such a laptop? Can you help me find out which of these laptops have hardware that
is well supported by Arch?

If you feel like sharing your experiences, both positive and negative it would be really helpful
(and even better if you tell me about laptop I can buy in Spain)

Thanks a lot in advance for the help,

Cheers,
Luca

stevenhoneyman · 2014-09-11 17:23:44

lucacerone wrote:

If you feel like sharing your experiences, both positive and negative it would be really helpful

I've used a laptop that has a touchscreen; it's not useful. Fingers and touchscreens do not work well with software designed for mouse/keyboard interaction.
Get an ipad for tablet-y stuff (facebook while watching tv, playing angry birds, or whatever), ,and a normal laptop for "proper" computing; productivity, work, etc.

That's what I've found anyway.

lucacerone · 2014-09-11 17:26:40

Thanks Steven,
I actually was afraid of this and was wondering if something like Unity might be of help?

DE usability aside, the hardware support was good? Which linux distro did you install?

Thanks for sharing your advice!

hahiss · 2014-09-12 22:53:30

I just got a Lenovo Flex 2 15, which is basically a laptop with a touchscreen once we get past the marketing. I'm a long-time Arch user and an even longer (15+year) linux user. And, truth be told, I wasn't looking for a touchscreen. Rather, I only ended up with one because this particular laptop had the features I wanted at the pricepoint I could afford.

In terms of UI stuff: I find having the touchscreen is sometimes useful. In particular, scrolling through documents/websites is nice, as is being able to just "grab" a terminal window (for example) and move it right where you want it. But as stevenhoneyman noted, the usefulness is otherwise limited.

In terms of support: I'm having some trouble getting my touchscreen to do everything it can. Basically, it seems like right now I have to choose between a driver that is accurate but not multitouch and a driver that is multitouch but is not accurate in any way no matter how I calibrate or configure it. (The device is an Atmel MaXTouch.)

kang · 2014-09-14 04:08:04

i find both the drivers and the desktops not very useful with touchscreen on linux.
its actually a little more useful on windows due to the better support.

You need big buttons and stuff. For scrolling i always end up using the trackpad.. its closer to the fingers

progandy · 2014-09-14 04:25:35

kang wrote:

You need big buttons and stuff. For scrolling i always end up using the trackpad.. its closer to the fingers

Well, it is nice for browsing. Start the browser, detach/flip the keyboard and use an on screen keyboard to enter urls if necessary.

Arch Linux

#1 2014-09-11 16:52:03

Laptop touch screen, can you share your experiences?

#2 2014-09-11 17:23:44

Re: Laptop touch screen, can you share your experiences?

#3 2014-09-11 17:26:40

Re: Laptop touch screen, can you share your experiences?

#4 2014-09-12 22:53:30

Re: Laptop touch screen, can you share your experiences?

#5 2014-09-14 04:08:04

Re: Laptop touch screen, can you share your experiences?

#6 2014-09-14 04:25:35

Re: Laptop touch screen, can you share your experiences?

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