Microsoft's bet on touch PCs fails to pay off


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all my devices are touch-abled now. old tablet pc was Wacom stylus only, but new tablet PC is dual pen/touch, smartphone: touch, tablet: touch, desktop: now with Leap Motion. granted, i'm square in the early adopter category for some things (Leap, tPC), but not in phone or tablets. people will come around.

On the desktop, how much do you actually use touch? Bought high ranking elected official and several IT Staff large touch AIOs. They're full of fingerprints and they basically went back to mouse after a week. The mouse is just more efficient on the desktop and there's really not much to touch on any kind of regular basis for general computer.

Just curious as to how you're using it (on the desktop, that is).

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On my windows 8 tablet i've often found myself wishing I had a mouse connected.

 

The problem I think is that Android and iOS were built from the ground up for touch where as windows feels like it's been shoehorned in.

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On my windows 8 tablet i've often found myself wishing I had a mouse connected.

 

The problem I think is that Android and iOS were built from the ground up for touch where as windows feels like it's been shoehorned in.

 

You can. Buy a wireless mouse and you will have a dongle plugged in USB if your tablet has one. Otherwise get a bluetooth mouse instead if USB ports are not included on windows tablet.

 

I have a bluetooth keyboard ... it works with any of my devices. Such as tablet, phone, PC.

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On my windows 8 tablet i've often found myself wishing I had a mouse connected.

 

The problem I think is that Android and iOS were built from the ground up for touch where as windows feels like it's been shoehorned in.

I'm the same. But it's because I can do more, and tend to want to do things that are simply mouse/keyboard-centric. Like Remote Desktop/Access to traditional apps.

I think it might be different if MS had left the desktop out of Surface RT. Even on that, I want to use Office, which is mouse/keyboard-centric. There's just not a whole lot of productivity/content creation that is touch centric. Touch has its place ... exactly where is that? Probably not on a device that works better with or makes you wish you had a mouse/keyboard.

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I think it might be different if MS had left the desktop out of Surface RT. Even on that, I want to use Office, which is mouse/keyboard-centric. There's just not a whole lot of productivity/content creation that is touch centric. Touch has its place ... exactly where is that? Probably not on a device that works better with or makes you wish you had a mouse/keyboard.

 

Keyboard I understand, mouse, not necessarily. If I had to write something up in Word, I don't use the mouse enough to need anything more accurate than my finger.

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Keyboard I understand, mouse, not necessarily. If I had to write something up in Word, I don't use the mouse enough to need anything more accurate than my finger.

 

Bingo.

 

Physical Keyboard is best for typing long letters such as reporters, newspapers, stories, etc.

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On the desktop, how much do you actually use touch? Bought high ranking elected official and several IT Staff large touch AIOs. They're full of fingerprints and they basically went back to mouse after a week. The mouse is just more efficient on the desktop and there's really not much to touch on any kind of regular basis for general computer.

Just curious as to how you're using it (on the desktop, that is).

 

frankly, right now not much. Leap is just not mature enough and the touch-interface software is pretty mediocre at best. Although this gets rid of the fingerprint problem, the 3D interaction space does call for a different paradigm than the "invisible hovering touchscreen" that the Leap software uses right now. The sensor itself is great so there's great potential in this space.

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You can. Buy a wireless mouse and you will have a dongle plugged in USB if your tablet has one. Otherwise get a bluetooth mouse instead if USB ports are not included on windows tablet.

 

I have a bluetooth keyboard ... it works with any of my devices. Such as tablet, phone, PC.

 

I have one for my laptop and I've been known to use it on the tablet, also have a bluetooth keyboard.

 

But if I end up carrying the keyboard/mouse/tablet then it's often easier to take the laptop instead that and my laptop is signficantly faster than the tablet. (i5 vs Atom)

 

There are some applications that really benifit nicely from the touch interface and some that really don't, I've seen Ekahau site survey be run on a windows tablet and that certianlly does make life easier if you're doing a physical site survey indoors than trying to use a laptop.

Although you'd still want a laptop or keyboard/mouse if you were doing a predictive survey/planning.

 

One thing I do want to try is the Wacom active stylus as that might be a nice alternative to the mouse for some things and my tablet (Latitude 10) does supposedly support it.

 

 

 

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Right. Which is why I always thought the Surface, which was designed to have a keyboard attached, was probably a better idea than the iPad, where Apple sort of said, "yeah, keyboards, we have those I guess."

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Work have a surface pro, haven't really used it much yet though the few times I did use it didn't like the keyboard cover, but the tablet itself seems pretty nice

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I have one for my laptop and I've been known to use it on the tablet, also have a bluetooth keyboard.

 

But if I end up carrying the keyboard/mouse/tablet then it's often easier to take the laptop instead that and my laptop is signficantly faster than the tablet. (i5 vs Atom)

 

There are some applications that really benifit nicely from the touch interface and some that really don't, I've seen Ekahau site survey be run on a windows tablet and that certianlly does make life easier if you're doing a physical site survey indoors than trying to use a laptop.

Although you'd still want a laptop or keyboard/mouse if you were doing a predictive survey/planning.

 

One thing I do want to try is the Wacom active stylus as that might be a nice alternative to the mouse for some things and my tablet (Latitude 10) does supposedly support it.

 

 

I understand that.

 

I have several laptops with varieties of OSes.. such as Vista, 7, Linux, etc. 

 

If I want to take photoshop with me somewhere.. then I take laptop with me.

 

If I want to surf the web, then I take a tablet with me. I have stylus as well for drawings, note taking, etc.

 

That's what the backpack is for. You take keyboard/mouse with you in case you couldn't do well with virtual keyboard.

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