Gallery: Make your notebook PC easier to use

The way a Touchpad works is controlled through a dialogue box tucked away in the Windows Control Panel. To see this dialogue box in Windows XP, click on the Start button and then on Control Panel. When it opens, click on Printers and Other Hardware, and then on Mouse. Vista users should open Control Panel in the same way then click on Mouse. The Mouse Properties dialogue box contains separate sections accessed by tabs at the top of the dialogue box. The Devices tab will probably be pre-selected. If it isn’t, click it now.

The default settings for the devices tab, as seen in the previous step, probably won’t need changing. However, if you use a mouse with your notebook and have a tendency to catch the Touchpad with your palm while typing, you might wish to tick the ‘Disable Touchpad/Stick when a USB pointing device is present’ checkbox. By doing so, the Touchpad is completely disabled whenever a USB mouse is plugged in. Now click on the Buttons tab to view the options shown here.

In the Double Click Speed section is a slider bar that determines how quick in succession two presses of a Touchpad button must be for them to be interpreted as a double-click. If you sometimes have problems clicking twice, the slider should be moved towards the Slow end of the scale. To move the slider, place the pointer over it, hold down the left Touchpad button, then use the left and right arrow keys to move the slider. To test the new settings, double-click on the left Touchpad button while the mouse pointer is over the test area. The folder icon should open and close on demand.

Click the Touchpad tab at the top of the dialogue box. The default settings are shown here. Notice that two options (Tap to Click and Taps and Drags) are already ticked. Tap to Click allows you to tap the Touchpad instead of clicking on the left button, or tap it twice to indicate a double-click. Taps and Drags allows you to tap the Touchpad twice to select an object on the screen, and then, while keeping your finger on the Touchpad, drag the object to a new location.

Sometimes you need to drag an object further than is possible by a single stroke of the finger across the Touchpad, and this is especially true when dragging files from one folder to another in Windows Explorer. To make long drags easier, we recommend ticking the Locking Drags box. What this does is allow you to drag objects long distances by lifting your finger off the Touchpad, then replacing your finger in a different position to continue dragging. Indicate that you have finished dragging by tapping your finger firmly on the Touchpad.

While exploring the options on the Touchpad tab, consider adjusting the slider bar to change the pad’s touch-sensitivity. Do this in the same manner as described in Step 2, moving the slider to the right if you prefer the Touchpad only to respond the firm presses, and moving it to the left if you prefer it to respond to gentler strokes. When you’ve found a setting that suits you, click on the Gestures tab to move on.

Touchpad gestures are great time-savers, yet by default they are turned off. Turn them on by clicking on the Enable Tap Zones checkbox. This activates the four corners of the Touchpad to perform a range of predefined actions or to emulate specific keys. Near each corner is a list that drops down when you click on the down-pointing arrow on its right. From each list, select the action you would like to assign to the corresponding corner, or choose Disabled if you do not wish a corner to have a special function.

It’s a good idea to assign the Secondary option to one of the corners. This makes it act like the secondary, or right, mouse button, which means Windows can be controlled entirely from the Touchpad without using the two physical buttons. The size of the four corner zones can also be increased or decreased. They can be individually adjusted by dragging the black square in the corner of each zone until the zone is the preferred size. In this example the top left-hand zone has been set as the Secondary button and is being increased in size. The other three zones have been disabled.

Click the EdgeMotion tab. Edgemotion is the ability to go on dragging an object on the screen in its current direction even after your finger reaches the edge of the Touchpad. It is turned on by default, and the speed at which dragging occurs is controlled by how hard you press on the Touchpad. Tick the ‘When Scrolling’ box and Edgemotion will also take effect when scrolling through long documents in a word processor or long pages in a web browser.

Before clicking OK to close the Mouse Properties dialogue box, take a look at some of the other things that can be configured. On the Pointer Options tab, for example, the speed of the mouse pointer and how it behaves can be altered. Similarly, if you sometimes have difficulty seeing where the pointer is on the screen, tick the option to show the location of the pointer when the Ctrl key is pressed. This displays a target that homes in on the pointer and makes it impossible to miss.

Before clicking OK to close the Mouse Properties dialogue box, take a look at some of the other things that can be configured. On the Pointer Options tab, for example, the speed of the mouse pointer and how it behaves can be altered. Similarly, if you sometimes have difficulty seeing where the pointer is on the screen, tick the option to show the location of the pointer when the Ctrl key is pressed. This displays a target that homes in on the pointer and makes it impossible to miss.