A recent Apple patent application depicts mockups of an OS X “Gesture Control Panel” with options for a Standard Trackpad, Basic Multitouch, and Advanced Multitouch. Although the trackpad and basic multitouch options have already made their way to Apple’s laptops, the advanced multitouch features are very intriguing. Read more »

That’s right - PCs will soon have the same capabilities as the new MacBook Air when it comes to the trackpad, thanks to Synaptic. They recently announced a new touchpad with support for various gestures including scrolling, zooming, and trackball-like movement. Mark Vena, vice president of Synaptics’ PC business unit, said that we can expect these to hit computers in late March or early April.

My take? Although the technology definitely has the “cool” factor and I would order one on a new laptop, I don’t think this will increase productivity all that much. Scrolling is one of the most common tasks, and we have been able to do that with our touchpads for a long time now. How often do you find yourself zooming in on photos or rotating them? Synaptics is poised to allow you to do that faster, but I don’t mind clicking a button or two to do that now. I am hoping the company dreams up some new uses for this technology that will truly make it indispensable.
Photo: http://www.apple.com/macbookair/features.html