For the longest of time, Microsoft and its OEM partners were pretty poor at making touchpads work seamlessly; better touchpad support has been a selling point for Macs.
This was until Microsoft made the ‘Precision Touchpad’ technology – a standard that helped OEMs make better touchpads. Microsoft uses Precision Touchpads in their Surface Pro and Book devices, and a few other OEMs use it as well – but it’s not used everywhere, and that is a problem.
The Touch
Several of Microsoft’s OEM partners – like HP – argue that using Precision Touchpad takes away the control from them; the OEM’s can no longer do their custom fine-tuning or add strange features that their customers might like.
Being able to custom-tune something should, in theory, have better results – but it doesn’t, and that’s why Precision Touchpad were made.
WinHEC
If you have ever bought a Windows 10 device, you will notice that it comes with a whole bunch of stickers on it – one of them says “Built for Windows 10;” The Windows Hardware Compatibility Program is Microsoft’s certification program for Windows – if a device can run the latest version of Windows, it gets the sticker.
At WinHEC, Microsoft announced that the Windows Hardware Compatibility Program will require a Precision Touchpad with future updates.
That would make Precision Touchpads mandatory for the device makers with Redstone 3 or 4 – perhaps the same update that brings us Project NEON.
Microsoft’s OEM partners would have no choice but to include Precision Touchpads in their new devices – as long as they wish to preload Windows 10 on their devices, and have that sticker.
Of course, the OEMs can simply ignore Microsoft’s certification program and not get the sticker; the OEM to make that plunge, however, will have to deal with the wrath of Microsoft.
There’s still plenty of time left until we see this minor change happen – a lot could change in between now and then – but if it does happen, it’s going to be good times for everyone on Windows 10.
Image Credit: WindowsCentral.com
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