Ploopy, the makers of the DIY-friendly peripherals, like the Ploopy Adept trackball and the Ploopy Trackpad, has just released the Ploopy Bean, a standalone pointing device that mimics the functionality of something like the Lenovo TrackPoint that has become so popular with ThinkPad users. However, ...
It’s possible to get keyboards with an integrated pointing stick, which is how I think most people use them. It’s just that most laptops don’t provide it as an option, so your options are very limited if you want that.
or:
www.pckeyboard.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&P…
(I own one of the latter, and can’t recommend it; while the buckling spring keyswitches are pretty much immortal, the mouse button switches wore out long before they did.
Honestly, what I’d really like is for a non-all-in-one form factor to be available. Like…laptops are intrinsically limiting, because I have to take what the laptop vendor chooses. That selection is limited. And today, laptops aren’t very modular. With a laptop, I can’t pick whatever touchpad or keyboard or whatever I want in the way that I can a desktop unless I haul both the built-in one and an external USB one.
I’d like to see something where there’s just a standard frame that opens that a display, keyboard, and touchpad/trackball/nipple mouse can be mounted on and then have the body of the PC separate, on a cable, so that the weight and heat isn’t there. That provides a lot more flexibility as to options. Mini-PCs can kind-of sort-of do the separate PC, though there’s no standard for attaching the input and display stuff, but there isn’t a convention for them having a battery whose charge they can monitor and act on.
I don’t personally care for the Thinkpad-style pointing stick, which is what this is aimed at addressing. But I damned well do want a touchpad with three physical buttons, which Thinkpads also have had. I can get external USB devices like that, but for integrated stuff, I’m pretty much at the laptop vendor’s mercy.
Rekall Incorporated
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