Most notebooks are controlled through a touchpad which enables you to move the mouse pointer in the operating system. Touchpads are hardly as efficient as a real mouse, but it is a tool we've grown accustomed to and it is good in the sense the it takes up very little space. Alps Electric has now presented a revolutionizing touchpad, where it has removed the actual touching.
It may sounds weirder than it really is, the "touchpad" presented by Alps Electrics simply doesn't require any direct contact. If you are as close as 3cm above the pad it registers the movement of your fingers, which makes it possible to navigate and control applications through simple hand gestures. During a demonstration the company showed how you could start a movie by simply moving the hand back and forth over the pad, and fast-forward and rewind by twisting the hand clockwise or counter-clockwise.
"Enabling to operate a device without touching it, the technology is expected to be used in a place where hands get too dirty to operate a device. Also, because the sensor can be embedded in a device, it allows greater flexibility in design of devices. The schedule for commercialization has yet to be decided."
We should not expect notebooks sporting this technology anytime soon, but it certainly feels like a cooler alternative to our rather pedestrian and mediocre touchpads.
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Alps Electric displays touchpad without touching
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