Author Topic: It's alive, it's alive!!! mwahaha! - WinButtons and 7" touchscreen works (Read 122,103 times)

wraith808 · « **Reply #50 on:** September 08, 2011, 09:34 PM »

^ I saw that, but I wasn't sure if he got a better price on it, and his experiences. But thanks.

And, I wonder if his experiences with this were better than yours with the HP hardware.

I found a couple of impressions on it, and it does seem promising...

http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/30/exopc-slate-hands-on/

http://blog.laptopmag.com/exopc-slate-hands-on-the-windows-7-tablet-weve-been-waiting-for

http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/27/exopc-slate-review/

http://makingwindowseasy.com/2011/03/03/hands-on-exopc-slate-review/

http://www.techradar.com/reviews/pc-mac/tablets/exopc-slate-913878/review

urlwolf · « **Reply #51 on:** September 09, 2011, 08:00 AM »

It's a tablet that can actually replace your netbook. I like it better because I would have used an external keyboard anyway, and on this form factor you can use portrait mode, which is better for coding.

It indeed does what a win7 box would do. As a touch OS it kind of sucks. I could not get it to do the automatic flipping when changing orientation. Forget about smooth scroll, pinch zoom, etc. The OS is waiting for the second click, so all the touch operations really suck compared to an ipad. But you can get real work done on this one. And use a real browser. And play HD video. I'd say it's a winner. I got it for free in intel's AppUp event. The meego OS it came with was prealpha. All attendants I know have installed something else.

nudone · « **Reply #52 on:** September 09, 2011, 08:47 AM »

Just another "tip" for anyone considering getting a MIMO (or similar).

The problem I mentioned before about the touchscreen not being recognised and having to disconnect and reconnect it several times appear to be related to the boot process.

Maybe there's just too much going on my machine on startup, too many monitors trying to work themselves out or something, who knows.

Anyway, the solution is to leave the touchscreen disconnected until everything else has finished loading in. I would assume this kind of problem won't manifest itself on the vast majority of setups.

nudone · « **Reply #53 on:** September 09, 2011, 06:12 PM »

I've run out of time and hardly had chance to have a proper go at getting WinButtons and the MIMO setup correctly.

I'm now away for 9 days so I'm hoping that by the time I get back Ath will have found every problem there is and resolved them all too

Good luck with it all...

Ath · « **Reply #54 on:** September 09, 2011, 07:24 PM »

I've received the MIMO Touchscreen, as ordered by nudone, today.

I've been a kid in a toy-shop ever since I unpacked it, it's soooo nice

Like reported by nudone, it works like a charm. I didn't release a new WinButtons version yet, but I've improved a few things already (last night), and I can now have a numeric keypad that sends it's digits and other keys to the active application

Made a few (not so sharp) pictures, to show what my first setup is.
It'll probably change a bit in the coming weeks, but I think I like it to be rather close to the keyboard, to be both easily viewable and hand-reachable.

This is the main screen, the MIMO and the keyboard (there's a second screen to the left of the main screen, but not on the photo)

And here's the layout nudone sent me, that I messed up for my own purpose, having a second layout of a numeric keypad (in green) on top of it. Just hidden under the NumPad Off button there's a NumPad On button, positioned exactly on top of each other. (The touchscreen is free-standing here, but I use it like in the other photo, resting on top of the keyboard)

I keep on thanking nudone for giving me this superduper gadget, but it's so awfully nice

Ath · « **Reply #55 on:** September 09, 2011, 07:30 PM »

Hm, that first picture hardly shows how I've positioned the screen on top of my keyboard:

nudone · « **Reply #56 on:** September 09, 2011, 08:20 PM »

Excellent. I'm glad it's working as there were plenty of reasons to think it might not.

Looking forward to see what you come up with. I'm feeling jealous already.

superboyac · « **Reply #57 on:** September 09, 2011, 09:37 PM »

This is the future right here, I'm loving it!

Ath · « **Reply #58 on:** September 09, 2011, 09:52 PM »

Oh, and if you might also get a MIMO, do get the drivers from the MIMOmonitors support pages, don't use the CD-ROM delivered ones, these are a bit out of date, at least on the CD I got. The updates improve the overall behavior of the screen and the touchpanel.

And be prepared to some heavy screen on/off flashing and resolution changes during installation of the display-link drivers

but it all works afterwards

cranioscopical · « **Reply #59 on:** September 11, 2011, 02:54 AM »

Quote from: Ath on September 09, 2011, 09:52 PM

do get the drivers from the MIMOmonitors support pages...

Thanks for the tip, Ath

Ath · « **Reply #60 on:** September 11, 2011, 06:34 PM »

I've released a WinButtons update today (here for who missed it), and just for the heck of it, I turned Off the 'return mouse to previous location after touching the touch-screen' option

(conveniently called 'Anchor mouse' in the settings' Properties page, AFAICS) (I turned it on earlier, to work in a configuration closely like nudone), to see if my CursorRestore feature works as designed, and I can report after about 1/2 day of use, it just 'feels right' (but I may be biased, though I try to avoid that).
I have not had the urge to turn that option back on in the touch-screen driver yet, so I guess it should work with most other touch-screens equally well, even if they don't offer a similar setting. Unless ofcourse their driver insists on moving the mouse to the touch-screen any time you bring your finger close to it

cranioscopical · « **Reply #61 on:** September 14, 2011, 02:24 PM »

My MIMO Touch2 arrived here yesterday. So, I hooked it up this morning.

I can see I'm going to have some fun. It blue-screens my new W7 box faster than I can say 'knife'. I know 'cos I was saying "that's not very knife" at the time (or some shorter, pithy words with roughly the same meaning).

No doubt there's a way round it, if not I'll try it on another machine here (though I want it on my main machine where it might actually be useful). Clearly, it's time now to set it aside and play a video game instead

Watch this space --> <--

nudone · « **Reply #62 on:** September 14, 2011, 07:17 PM »

Oh dear. Hopefully just a "typical" driver issue. I have faith you'll get it to work, just not in the straightforward way we'd all expect. (Like I mentioned before, I have to connect the mimo after everything else has finished loading in - but I'm sure this wasn't the case with the mymo - that just worked, but the software wasn't so good; which might not matter anyway now that Ath has modified things since.)

cranioscopical · « **Reply #63 on:** September 14, 2011, 09:36 PM »

Quote from: nudone on September 14, 2011, 07:17 PM

Oh dear. Hopefully just a "typical" driver issue.

Yes, thanks. Just took another swing at it and now I'm replying to you from the MIMO screen. Now, where did I put that copy of WinButtons...

Ath · « **Reply #64 on:** September 15, 2011, 06:44 AM »

Quote from: nudone on September 14, 2011, 07:17 PM

I have to connect the mimo after everything else has finished loading in

Haven't seen that behavior here, but I do notice the horrendous flashing of the screen when connecting the MIMO to a running system, because of the DisplayLink drivers 'configuring stuff the right way'. If I leave the MIMO connected I don't see the flickering, not even during system startup or login. The systems I have used it on so far are rather high-end, considering current state of hardware, and Win7.
I assume you got the latest drivers from the MIMO & DisplayLink site?

Quote from: cranioscopical on September 14, 2011, 09:36 PM

Just took another swing at it and now I'm replying to you from the MIMO screen.

Glad you rebooted just often enough to get it right

cranioscopical · « **Reply #65 on:** September 15, 2011, 03:53 PM »

Quote from: Ath on September 15, 2011, 06:44 AM

Glad you rebooted just often enough to get it right

I see your point

At the moment I'm still floundering.

MIMO is monitor 3 and is somehow paired with monitor 1, thus any touch on the MIMO reults in 'tablet' input to monitor 1.
For example with 'numkeypad' active on MIMO, touching the buttons (or should I say hammering — the 'touch' isn't quite what I expected) gives tablet input on monitor 1.
MIMO is set to 'extend my desktop...' not to mirror #1
I think that the Displaylink drivers are thwarted by something (probably me).
The best thing is to rip out the drivers and go again.

I didn't expect 2 USB connectors on the MIMO. Just one powers it perfectly well on my box.

nudone · « **Reply #66 on:** September 15, 2011, 04:05 PM »

I'll be honest and admit I didn't try the latest drivers; I'll try them when I get back.

Is anyone using the mimo with win7 64 bit? Just wondering if that's going to be a problem when I move from 32 bit.

Stoic Joker · « **Reply #67 on:** September 15, 2011, 04:41 PM »

Not quite the same thing... But I had a client last week that had a Win7 x64 machine and an external video adapter that used the DisplayLink drivers. I had to DL the latest from their site to get it running, but it worked just fine.

Ath · « **Reply #68 on:** September 15, 2011, 06:31 PM »

Quote from: cranioscopical on September 15, 2011, 03:53 PM

MIMO is monitor 3 and is somehow paired with monitor 1, thus any touch on the MIMO reults in 'tablet' input to monitor 1.

Oh, yeah, the driver does have the quirk of setting the wrong default monitor as the touch-related monitor, you'll have to correct that like this:
[attachthumb=#]

The circled label-like control is actually a button that lets you select the monitor (3) that has the touch-capability.
Not sure if I also had to correct that with the original drivers, but seeing it misbehave in this version, I guess I did.

Quote from: nudone on September 15, 2011, 04:05 PM

Is anyone using the mimo with win7 64 bit? Just wondering if that's going to be a problem when I move from 32 bit.

Yup, works just very fine over here

Ath · « **Reply #69 on:** September 15, 2011, 06:35 PM »

Quote from: Stoic Joker on September 15, 2011, 04:41 PM

an external video adapter that used the DisplayLink drivers

Seeing the advertisements on their site, it looks like they are used a lot with the Digital school-boards lots of school are already or starting to use, providing the combination of projector display and touch- or hand-pointer- input.

cranioscopical · « **Reply #70 on:** September 15, 2011, 08:43 PM »

Quote from: nudone on September 15, 2011, 04:05 PM

I'll be honest and admit I didn't try the latest drivers; I'll try them when I get back.

Is anyone using the mimo with win7 64 bit? Just wondering if that's going to be a problem when I move from 32 bit.

That's what I have.

So far I've not tried very hard. I just finished setting up and tweaking a new W7 machine that needs to suit my work style (which isn't really the W7 way). My appetite for munching on this is therefore somewhat dulled

I am using the latest drivers from DisplayLink.

I was pretty sure I'd covered that button, Ath, but then I was pretty sure that today is Friday (it's Thursday here).

Ath · « **Reply #71 on:** September 15, 2011, 08:48 PM »

And did you calibrate it too? Or did the driver just mess up that setting after the first connect?

Ath · « **Reply #72 on:** September 15, 2011, 08:49 PM »

Oh, but it's not Friday yet (about one hour to go to finish up Thursday)

cranioscopical · « **Reply #73 on:** September 15, 2011, 11:13 PM »

Connected and working.

As you know, the DisplayLink driver on the installation CD won't work on W7-64, so I had downloaded the latest from DisplayLink's site (though I discovered also that w7 will 'go fetch' that like a good ~~dog~~ O/S, without intervention).

I had also dl'd the latest touch stuff from MIMO and installed that. BUT I just couldn't get the thing to calibrate properly.

So, I ripped it all out again, rebooted, and applied the latest DisplayLink driver (again) and then the touch software from the CD — NOT the updated version. That version looks very different, but it works right away. The whole thing took about 10 minutes — including uninstalling, reinstalling, and calibration.

When I have the patience I'll replace the touch software with what I downloaded and see if that now works for me (though I can't see that it would offer any advantage).

I'm beginning to realize that any enterprise that I undertake is going to suffer from some fool doing the wrong thing

Tomorrow I can play with WinButtons. Obviously, right now, at least some of what I touch on the MIMO screen occurs on the MIMO screen — not at all the point of my having one.

For me, the logical place for the MIMO is in the middle of my keyboard where it's equally accessible to ~~any of my three~~ either hand.

Ath · « **Reply #74 on:** September 16, 2011, 06:12 AM »

Quote from: cranioscopical on September 15, 2011, 11:13 PM

the logical place for the MIMO is in the middle of my keyboard

Yeah that feels right, I've been thinking of using ducktape to firmly attach the mimo to my keyboard so if I move that around, the mimo moves with it, and I always have it within hands-reach. I expect it to get a bit clunky though.