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Comment by briandw | Hacker News Reader

We just bought the Neo for our daughter to use at school. My biggest concern was the trackpad. This is the first MacBook to not use a force touch trackpad since they were introduced. I must say that the new trackpad is really good. It's not quite as good as the force touch one in my MacBook Pro, but it's close. We will see how well the Neo holds up over time, but it's off to a good start.

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I never use the physical touch on the MacBook Pro or MacBook Air. It’s one of the first things I configure so that a light tap is a click. It somehow feels “faster” to me.

how do you select text?

Three finger drag. That was the best and unique thing about apple touchpads since, like, early 2000s, but then it was buried deep down the menus and forgotten for some reason. But seriously - try it, you might never go back.

Yep: tap to click and 3-finger drag are amazing. I know mice are useful, particularly for games, but every time I'm forced to use one when helping someone with their computer I absolutely rage at it. Apple's trackpads, and software for same, are a big reason I'm not tempted to go back to Linux.

The trackpads on the old (pre-force-touch MacBooks) were really good. The force-touch is (IMO) slightly better, but it's a slight difference.

I'll agree they were all great, but I liked the change to force-touch more.

The uni-body pre force-touch trackpads clicked on a hinge from the top and you would need to press much harder in that area.

It’s certainly better than most trackpads on non Macs, especially because it “clicks” ok even on the top part.

I've had many MacBook Pros but never thought about that. I guess mine has too. How do I use it? I just tap lightly to click.

pretty much the only time I use it is to lookup the definition of a word by highlighting it and force clicking. Can't do that with the magic mouse.

Interesting. I find it easier just to CTRL-click it and pressing down on a flat surface.

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