Trackpoint Question

[spuriousgeorge]

My wife is an English professor, and recently her university gave her a Dell Inspiron, which has a little Trackpoint-like nub in the middle of the keyboard. I tried the nub and really liked it.

I'm interested in buying a mechanical keyboard with one, but unfortunately there appear to be only two options, the Trackpoint- and Trackpoint II-equipped Model M's and the Unicomp Endurapro. I was leaning toward the Endurapro because of its Windows keys (some people don't use them, I know; I'm not one of those people) until I read some unfavorable reviews, invariably comparing its Trackpoint to Lenovo's, which I understand is very well regarded.

My question is whether the Endurapro's Trackpoint is bad or whether it's only bad in comparison with Lenovo's Trackpoint.

Thanks, Geekhackers!   

[bhtooefr]

It's quite bad, trust me on this one.

My order of preference for pointing devices:

TrackPoints, good non-IBM/Lenovo pointing sticks, mice, good touchpads, mediocre pointing sticks, trackballs, bad touchpads, Unicomp pointing sticks.

[spuriousgeorge]

That's pretty bad, wow.

When you say Trackpoints, are you referring only to the newer Lenovo iterations, or are the Trackpoints on Model M's serviceable?

Thanks, bhtooefr!

[spuriousgeorge]

Anyone out there used an M13?

I'd love to get your thoughts, not just on the Trackpoint but on the typing experience as well, specifically on whether the typing experience is as nice as the typing experience on a 1391401.

[bhtooefr]

I should say that I'm specifically referring to the TrackPoint IV.

The TrackPoint II as used on the M13... it's not bad per se, but the sensitivity is fairly low for modern screens IMO, and it lacks the negative inertia that the TrackPoint III added (which greatly improves precision in real use).

Basically, as far as I can tell, here's what each revision of TrackPoint added:

TrackPoint II: The original (because the first device called TrackPoint was a weird convertible mouse/trackball thing), behaved exactly like an ordinary 2-button PS/2 mouse as far as protocol goes AFAIK (although I think there was an undocumented protocol to get the raw force data, based on this)
TrackPoint III: Added negative inertia, still behaved exactly like a 2-button mouse (but again would have had the undocumented raw force data protocol)
TrackPoint IV: Added press-to-select (virtual Z axis for tapping the TrackPoint to click), and used a new protocol to add third button support and customizable parameters for force and negative inertia tweaking (the force tweaking exposed in the driver, the negative inertia tweaking never exposed). IBM/Lenovo can never decide how much of this to expose on a USB device, though - some of the keyboards appear to have everything exposed, and some look like generic three-button USB mice with no parameter tweaking whatsoever except IIRC for press-to-select (everything else being done at the OS level).

[spuriousgeorge]

Thanks so much, bhtooefr!

My question, since you seem to be a big fan of Trackpoints and since you belong to a forum whose members mostly use mechanical keyboards, is what kind of compromise have you come to? Do you use a newer Lenovo keyboard with an excellent Trackpoint and scissor switches, an older IBM with a not-so-excellent Trackpoint and buckling springs, or something else altogether?

[mooswa]

I am waiting for this one: http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=53127.0;topicseen
If it does not deliver on the trackpoint quality I will probably get one from Lenovo keyboard and replace.  Similarly to what was done here: http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=11420.0

[spuriousgeorge]

Awesome stuff, mooswa!

I'm not great mechanically, so I don't know about the build-it-yourself solution, but the Tex keyboard looks amazing. Any idea how far along they are in developing it?

[spuriousgeorge]

A minute ago, I stumbled upon this prototype for the Poker III (http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=46423.0), which looks pretty similar to the Beetle prototype. The only thing that turns me off about the former keyboard is that tiny right shift key.

[bhtooefr]

My question, since you seem to be a big fan of Trackpoints and since you belong to a forum whose members mostly use mechanical keyboards, is what kind of compromise have you come to? Do you use a newer Lenovo keyboard with an excellent Trackpoint and scissor switches, an older IBM with a not-so-excellent Trackpoint and buckling springs, or something else altogether?

I use a Unicomp keyboard at work (and do not use the pointing stick on it, had I known it was going to be that bad I wouldn't have gotten the pointing stick), a Matias Tactile Pro 4 and occasionally a 122-key Model F at home, and a MacBook Pro Retina (so touchpad only, and with a seriously mediocre keyboard - when I needed to replace my frankensteined ThinkPad, it was the only option that wasn't a downgrade on pixel count) as my laptop.

[spuriousgeorge]

I agree with you on the Macbook's keyboard being middling.

Have never tried Lenovo's Trackpoint, but the more I hear about it, the more I want to. I might be able to stomach scissor switches if it's as good as everyone says.

Although I may just hold out for the new iteration of the Beetle.