I’m looking into getting myself a trackpad or touchpad for my stationary computer, after sitting with Fedora 39 with Gnome 45; I just fell in love with gestures. Problem here is that I don’t know what works with GNU/Linux out of the box. So I’m reaching out to others that have a recommendation of a CHEAP product, because I’m not going to buy a Magic Trackpad 2+ from Apple. Out of the question to spend 120-160 USD before even paying for it to get home. I just want something that works.
I have been looking into the Keymecher Mano 703 UB it works with windows, but not fully on OSX, I don’t really know how far the drivers for it have come regarding Linux, so I wonder if someone have tested it or another touch accessory that works.
Cheap for me is around 50 USD. Please let the recommendations rain down. ^^
EDIT; Seems that most of the alternatives aren’t really good alternatives, I think I’m going to get a Magic Trackpad 2. It will be my first bought Apple product. My first was a PowerPC that I got from my uncle. Never used it.
IDK of any decent linux touchpad, but I’m subbing to this thread, lmao.
Just don’t buy seenda touchpads. I’ve got one for my windows work laptop, but the gestures in linux don’t work at all. Heck, this thing’s click and right click (tap, double-tap, button to hold right click and hold right click) and other buttons don’t work either under linux!
If I could, I’d happily buy an Apple Magic Trackpad 2. Problem with that is I recall it’s BT only, but I want a wired one.
For gaming on linux and windows, my main driver is the kensington expert trackball (wireless), which works under linux great (albeit you can’t customize the buttons, but I don’t care about that anyway). Well, TBH, I don’t use gestures in linux as heavily as in windows, because linux just works so well with just a keyboard (all heil tilling WMs). Even back in Plasma, I was just using Super + 1-9 z-. on my keyboard for all the latte-dock shortcuts and the workspace was switching automatically depending on which program I wanted to go through (say super + 4 to go to firefox on workspace 1, or super + z to go to thunderbird on workspace 3 and so on).
When I was trying out GNOME Shell, I didn’t make use of gestures as much, pretty sure it has similar gestures, but I’m sure I’d probably use the keyboard just as much anyway (given either a decent dock, or just super and then using arrow keys to navigate to the proper window, then enter, which would be slower than what I’m doing on my WM).
Please don’t get the K400+ it is a Horror Show. Keys are too close together, the touch pad is just horrendous, it lags, setting are saved in the OS not on the keyboard so when you want F row to be F row by default, not fucking Fn row, you can’t…
I mostly use it as a compact replacement for keyboard and mouse when I need to install OS on other people’s stuff and I hate it every time.
I just tried it on my ThinkPad with Fedora on it - no gestures out of the box.
But that K83 looks interesting, I’d love some feedback if anyone has one.
Nah, it’s either BT or Wire actually. I got it to work in Win10 & Win11 with some kind of hackintosh drivers, the gestures are working in Windows, but they are really no match for the one OS that has the superior gestures so far which is Fedora with Gnome. I love the gestures that they have created for trackpads there. It makes me want to ditch Windows all together. Microsoft really need to up their game with the peripherals if they want to have users in the future.
Linux has the best support for the Magic Trackpad 2, but every distro has it’s own gesture template which sucks. I want to use two fingers, three fingers and four fingers in the same way standardized between every OS regardless if it’s Windows or a random GNU/Linux distro.
If you get the chance to test a magic trackpad 2 in Fedora (GNOME 45+) you’ll see what I mean.
I bought mine with the black glass or what it is on Facebook market. The only irritating thing about it is that when I am to connect it, it says “Daniel’s Magic Trackpad”, since that was the prior owner. "/ They are expensive but well worth the expense. I never thought I would ever buy an Apple product in my entire life, but IF this one ever breaks I’m definitely going to buy one again. They really nailed it with that product, it’s big and smooth, and you know when the battery is totally empty, (it stops making the click noises). The only setback for it, is probably the windows hackintosh driver, since it disconnects the trackpad randomly after it’s not been in use, sometimes it doesn’t disconnect in 24 hours other times it’s 20 minutes, and you need to shut it of, start it again and play with it till Windows reacts that it’s there again. Not a big deal. In Linux it just works, and the same problems doesn’t exist at all.
I recommend it really. All other options are a waste of money if you ask me. (Damn, I’m actually protecting and promoting an apple product. . . )
The gestures is totally dependable on the distro maintainers usage. It’s different in every distro. I have tried maybe 15 distros and they all have different setups for the magic trackpad. Fedora (Gnome) has the best one from my perspective, it’s smooth and feels like you dipped your hand in water and that is not the same experience I get from other distros, and windows. . . it has the worst gestures, but I also needed a hackintosh github driver to get it working in Win10/11.
I already have a deltaco keyboard that looks kind of like the K400, but while it actually works in linux, it’s still so darn small and I rather use a mouse. When it comes to the Magic Trackpad that I ended up buying, it’s one of the best buys I’ve done in a while.
The K83 looked interesting, but I ended up with a Magic Trackpad 2, some time ago now after I wrote this post, and it’s a godsend. ^^ I also bought a Keychron M1 wireless mouse and Keychron V1 Max wireless keyboard yesterday that can be connected through blutooth to 3 devices at the same time basically and 1 wi-fi. So if I need keyboard, mouse and a trackpad, they’re now all wireless and easy to switch between the Steam Deck, Stationary Computer VM’s, the Phone and alternatively in the future a Raspberry Pi again. ^^
Don’t worry, that’s the same feeling I have about the Magic Trackpad 2, which, hey, I might eventually buy, but as of now, I’m alright. My cheapo (what the heck was this again?) no brand-name touchpad works great on my work laptop. I’m pretty sure it’d do the same thing in GNOME Shell (I’ve used GNOME Shell on both Fedora and Ubuntu and it was great to use with gestures).
The only “problem” is that I’m using a tillingWM, meaning that I barely get my hands off my keyboard. I have an old touchpad ripped from an old laptop and it functions literally like a dumb mouse (no gestures and miraculously, it has a built-in touch scroll on the right side). If I’m not using this, I’m using my kensington expert trackball…
Really? Lately when I have tried nothing was like Fedora was set up. "/ POP!_OS 22.04 LTS is still based on the GNOME shell, and it has different one’s. I should test it again, haven’t been on Linux more then a couple minutes just to update the systems. So it’s been like almost a 6 month’s since I actively used Linux. "/ All because of some drive failures with two kingston cheap ass crap m.2 sticks. "/
Oh. Yeah. Sometimes standards are created and sometimes some *diot think’s it’s a good idea to use their own preferences in order to create a new standard. Linux Users in a nutshell. "/
