Apple Quietly Adds "Magic" Features to MacBooks

[Paul Daniel Ash]

The driver software needed to support the new Magic Trackpad also enables certain multi-touch features on older MacBooks and MacBook Pros, according to an Apple support document. As noted by Cult of Mac's David Martin among other MacBook users, the update was made available via Apple Software Update to compatible systems, which enables three-finger swiping and inertial scrolling on the built-in trackpad. Windows drivers are also available for the new device.

Apple released Magic Trackpad and Multi-Touch Trackpad Update 1.0 yesterday at the same time the Magic Trackpad was announced. In addition to providing hardware support for the Bluetooth peripheral, the update adds a Trackpad system preference pane for Intel based Mac desktop computers running Mac OS X 10.6.4 and above. But as a bonus, the update also allows users of MacBook and MacBook Pro notebooks manufactured since 2009 to take advantage of some multi-touch gestures that were previously available only on the MacBook Pro and Mac Book air glass multi-touch trackpad, as well as the Magic Trackpad. Specifically, three-finger swiping - which allows you to page through documents in gestures in Finder, Mail, Preview, iMovie, Safari and other applications - and/or two-finger inertial scrolling are now supported on the following computers:

Inertial Scrolling and Three-Finger Drag Gesture Support

These Mac portables support inertial scrolling and the three-finger drag gesture after you install Magic Trackpad and Multi-Touch Trackpad Update 1.0:

MacBook
MacBook (13-inch, Early 2009)
MacBook (13-inch, Mid 2009)
MacBook (13-inch, Late 2009)
MacBook (13-inch, Aluminum, Late 2008)

MacBook Pro
MacBook Pro (17-inch, Mid 2010)
MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2010)
MacBook Pro (17-inch, Mid 2009)
MacBook Pro (15-inch, 2.53 GHz, Mid 2009)
MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2009)
MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2009)
MacBook Pro (17-inch, Early 2009)
MacBook Pro (17-inch, Late 2008)

The following Mac portables support inertial scrolling after installing Magic Trackpad and Multi-Touch Trackpad Update 1.0:

MacBook Air
MacBook Air
MacBook Air (Mid 2009)

MacBook Pro
MacBook Pro (15-inch, Early 2008)
MacBook Pro (17-inch, Early 2008)

Apple also released Magic Trackpad drivers for 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows, allowing Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 users on any computer, as well as Macs running Windows under Boot Camp, to use the new peripheral.

Source: Cult of Mac

[zozodouce]

Who cares they need to fix the iphone4.

[glassJAw]

^Haha¡

[P911sc]

If you don't care then why bother posting or even checking the thread. I was hoping inertial scrolling would be enabled. Sweet!

[katmeef]

anyone else find single clicks are much more responsive after switching from one finger to three finger dragging in trackpad preferences? i'm noticing it the most when changing tabs in openoffice spreadsheets, it's sweet

[Shishir G]

GREAT! I see more awesome updates in the future!

[Newgy]

Who cares they need to fix the iphone4.

That would be a honorable statement, if the iPhone was their only product... The MacBook series is what made them legendary

[moribo]

Who cares they need to fix the iphone4.

I pay £1200 for my MacBook Pro.. You pay £500. I think I get priority you moron.

[moon#pie]

You both are dumb because they have different engineers working in different areas of Apple. I doubt most of the iphone engineers have even met the macbook guys. And BTW, I said this yesterday.

[bllewisii]

Pardon me for sounding ignorant, but what exactly is inertial scrolling?

EDIT: Ha! Never mind. I guess I could have done a quick Google search to find that out...

[Thailocalguy808]

Need to fix if head your getting bad reception issues wrong thread

[lulzMike]

Wait, so the track pad works for PC's?

[domthebigbomb]

it looks like were devolving

[mad102190]

I want to see if its possible to enable the 3-finger swiping on the older (eg. my Early 2008 MBP) models. I remember people enabled 4-finger gestures on older models before they were enabled by default when Snow Leopard rolled out. I remember I had 4-finger gestures on Leopard and I felt like a boss lol

[rhekt]

Awesome! I love updates

[KartRacer]

Chrome seems to not like inertial scrolling. Stutters for me, anybody else have this happen to them?

[kuhndsn]

[QUOTE=zozodouce;5365497]Who cares they need to fix the iPhone.

This news is for Mac. If you only care about the iPhone then filter your news to show
Only the iPhone news and not all. And what is wrong with rhe iPhone? Return it buddy. Get off yesterdays tears.

[TheOrioles33]

[quote=kuhndsn;5365724]

And what is wrong with rhe iPhone? Return it buddy. Get off yesterdays tears.

LOL! You tell em!

[awesomeSlayer]

A nice update. The scrolling feels different now.

[Aliquippakid]

This is great for all of the users missing features but I must disagree that the MacBook made them legendary. I think the iPod and iPhone have handled that. The computers have always been great tho