I recently acquired one thinking it was going to be a cool and useful feature, and the only time I think to use it is when I brush away a loose cat hair and my cursor goes all over the place. And the tablet mode, I think I used it once as a novelty.

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[–] 66 points 1 month ago

Me: so rarely that I keep forgetting it's a touch screen

My wife and daughter: constantly, so my screen is full of their fingerprints

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  • [–] 28 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Never. I didn’t realise it had a touch screen when I got it, i disabled it, and I don’t miss it.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    Wait you can disable that shit?

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  • [–] 13 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    It appears in Gnome and Xfce as a touchpad, turn it off in settings.

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  • [–] 22 points 1 month ago

    I use one for sound recording, as tapping controls on a screen makes far less noise than a keyboard or mouse of any make or model.

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  • [–] 22 points 1 month ago

    Mine is a two-in-one where the keyboard can fold fully backwards and it puts the laptop in "tablet mode." I use it constantly for reading comic books, as rotating to a portrait frame and swiping through pages is much easier than scrolling/zooming on each page with mouse and keyboard.

    I also occasionally use it for doodling when I'm traveling, but I've got a nicer setup for that on my desktop. So that's a corner case.

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  • [–] 9 points 1 month ago

    Only to answer teams calls because I can hit the notification with my pinkie rather then moving my hand to the mouse.

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  • [–] 8 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    ITT: people hating on touchscreens

    Also ITT: people pointing out really good reasons to have a touch screen.

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    [–] 8 points 1 month ago (2 children)

    I had a Surface Pro all through college, and used it for note taking in all my classes (pen on screen), which was fantastic. Haven't really used the touchscreen function since though, and it's been quite a few years.

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    [–] 7 points 1 month ago

    Pretty much never. Even if my hands are dry and clean, I get annoying marks on the screen.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

    Sometimes, mostly for a quick volume or pause/play press.

    Being able to fold it right round can be useful as it uses less space when you are just playing a video or something. (Less chance of damaging it while cooking too!)

    I got a fancy one with a pen, but found that trains are really not as smooth as I thought so the plan of learning to draw on the train never happened.

    Edit: the pen support has come in useful for electronically signing things multiple times!

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  • [–] 7 points 1 month ago*

    Mostly simple things. Changing and closing tabs and windows, toggling bluetooth, etc. Anything where the button is visible and big enough hit easily.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    all the time. sucks to go back.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago

    From the first moment I used a touchscreen laptop, every laptop I have encountered is a touchscreen to my unconcious mind... Doesn't matter how old, without thinking I just touch that screen.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago*

    Work laptop. I use it when I’m sharing my screen and we’re discussing a map or drawing of something. Pretty useful. Especially the pinch zoom function when whatever app I’m using doesn’t have an intuitive zoom function.

    Not work laptop. If I’m reading an article on the couch sometimes I’ll scroll down using the touch screen.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago

    Literally never. Never on purpose, at least.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 month ago

    I don't use it consciously. But I do notice when I'm using a laptop without touchscreen - so I probably use it more than I think.
    I mostly use it in tent mode with keyboard and mouse attached tho.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago

    I honestly forget it had a touchscreen all the time. I grew up before the prevalence of touch screen devices so it never occurs to me that something with a built in physical keyboard could be interacted with that way.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago

    Since the battery in the pen stopped charging, almost never now.

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  • [+] 5 points 1 month ago (1 child)
  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago (1 child)

    used to have one. loved it. I hate trackpads and having a touchscreen saved me from cramping the tendons in my hand.

    bring back the nipple!

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago

    I recently pulled out my previous laptop that I'd used for several years before getting my current one. I don't remember how long I'd had the previous one, but it's been quite a few years.

    While working on my project with that laptop I accidentally bumped it and knocked it off my desk. Reflexively, I grabbed for it and managed to catch it by the corner of the screen.

    And that's how I found out my laptop had a touchscreen.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 month ago

    Disabled it in BIOS, most useless feature in a laptop. Yoga like laptops that can flip the screen 18 degrees, sure. But a regular laptop - just why?

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    Those laptops with the reversible screen and the Surface are convenient for genuinely using the touch screen on the go to play simple time killing games while waiting in public without messing with the peripherals

    The ones that are just normal laptops with built in keyboards and a folding touchscreen only ever got touched when someone was demonstrating that it was a touchscreen

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    I used to note take constantly on the Surface line so all the time. Even now I still use it quite a bit since it became so natural.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    Every once in a while I accidentally tap and am reminded I have a touch screen.

    I have a much older laptop with a stylus interface that I'll use to draw things when I need to.

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  • I use to use mine regularly, it was nice ergonomically to change between the trackpad and touchscreen. My arm needs a rest from being tucked up next to the trackpad. This makes most sense if the laptop is on your actual lap. Can't do it anymore since my laptop broke.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 month ago

    I miss having it, I still occasionally forget I don't have it. I would use it to select tabs, open programs, scroll pages, zoom in and out. I loved it, I'm legit thinking of replacing my current laptop screen with one that is a touch screen.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    When I had a work laptop with one, I used it daily for quick UI things, browser windows, start menu stuff. I used it a lot. I'd never spend more to own one myself, but the work one I had was nice.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    I don't have one, but when I was at uni one of the lecturers had this dinky old-looking laptop that apparently had a touchscreen, and he would project the screen and draw on it during lectures, which worked really well to illustrate what he was talking about. Had some software to just draw on top of what he was presenting, to be clear.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    I bought a cheap 8" tablet on eBay many years ago, and really liked using it for college. Then when my regular laptop broke and I had some money, I went for one of those 13" Yoga thinkpads, thinking it would replace both the tablet and the aging laptop.

    In the 7 or so years since I bought it, I can count the number of years that I used it on two hands. I've used the shitty old 2013 dell tablet more than the touch screen / pen input on the laptop. It mostly lives in a docking station on my desk, or gets used as a regular laptop. It's just too big to be used as a tablet, period. Cool concept, wasn't worth the extra money for me.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago*

    Very rarely. It’s my work laptop so I always have the mouse available. Occasionally it will sometimes be easier to just reach over and tap something on the screen.

    Oh, and I hate the trackpad.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    When I had one, I used it a couple of times to play Civilization V on an airplane.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    My work laptop is a touch screen, The only time I've used it is when I accidentally brushed the corner of the screen reaching passed and closed the window I was working on.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    I've had two and the only time I've used it is by accident. Something like the Lenovo Yoga where you can put it into touchscreen/drawing mode would work, but I don't see how it's useful to touch your screen at a weird angle.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    Sometimes it's faster than finding the mouse cursor when clicking a link or a button (and when filling in forms with check boxes), but probably my biggest use is if I'm browsing around Google maps or Earth.

    Click-drag click-drag on the trackpad is just slow and frustrating compared to just dragging the on-screen image.

    I use a macbook sometimes and it's a bit infuriating when I try to drag the screen.

    I don't use it constantly but I'm used to having the choice whenever I decide it's easier.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    All the time because the Surface keyboard is a piece of shit

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    The vast majority of the time on accident when pointing to something on the screen, maybe a couple times on purpose when the mouse was in an awkward place.

    I would rather not use the touchscreen but it doesn't come up enough for me to find the setting to turn it off.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    i never thought I'd ever use my touchscreen but now I'm touching the screen of my other laptop that doesn't have a touchscreen out of habit...

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    Only with the fancy stylus that came with it.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 month ago

    I put FydeOS on mine and Sketchbook. I use it almost entirely as a tablet and draw with a USI stylus.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    Never

    If anything, it can be annoying when you go to clean something on the screen

    I think I just self-reported my age...

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    I pretty much only use touchscreen for kolourpaint so I can do some math or something

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    I usually don't use it.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    never bought one for it and never used it on ones that have it. its surprisingly common for the last many years and it was sorta hard to avoid if you otherwise don't care and were looking for a baseline of features at the best price.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 month ago

    Used to have one, literally never.

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