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Touch Screen Monitor for Mac Mini

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  • Big Green

    In Christ Alone
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    Mar 5, 2018
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    College Station
    Buying a dedicated computer for our kids for homeschooling. They each have a Kindle Fire and they also use momma’s iPhone and iPad for educational apps. Now it’s time to dedicate a single piece of equipment to their education. Oldest is nine, youngest is five with two siblings in between.

    I thought about just buying a Mac but if they messed up the screen I would be upset. Also, as they are used to swiping and tapping screens I figure that’s a pretty easy transition for the youngest ones. We have been moving toward Apple products and this seems like a logical step for all of us.

    So, any recommendations for a touch screen monitor that works well with Mini?
    Guns International
     

    JColumbus

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    Jun 28, 2012
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    DONT: I'll explain.

    There are a couple of things you can do to get this done.

    1. There are a couple of devices you put on the top of a Macbook and it somehow reads your gestures and makes it touch screen. I stopped following that idea due to disinterest, but I don't know if any of them came to market.

    2. You can use an Ipad as a monitor for the Mac and yes it will work for touch screen. BUT DON'T. From my experience it's not nice. WHY? Because Mac OS in not built for touch screen and there are a lot of places to touch on Mac OS. It's not an iPad, it's a full blown operating system and your kids will hate it. Mine did.

    3. There are touch screen HDMI monitors out there that I've only read work with Mac OS, but the same principle applies in number two.

    The new Magic Tracpad Twos are great. They're also huge compared to child hands and there are a TON of gestures. There are third party apps that allow you to ad even more gestures. I'm confident that is all you will need and I'm sure they'll like it. Only takes a tiny bit of gettin used to.

    Not to mention, they need to learn how to interface between hand held devices and actual computers. It's very important they learn to type, as well.

    Last, I am selling a fully specked out 15" Macbook Pro with a 2019 keyboard that just came back from Apple. I need the 16" due to the 64GB ability. For not too much more than a Mac Mini, you can have the option between portability and desk top use, 32GB RAM, 2TB PCIE drive, and 2.9gz i9 6 core processor. I used it on 4 monitors at a time with zero issues.

    Let me know if you're interested, but whatever you do, get a proper mac, with the proper peripherals. Let the iPads be for fun easy going activity and the computer be for hard work, concentration, and disciplined focus. I find my kids view the two like that.

    God bless.
     

    candcallen

    Crotchety, Snarky, Truthful. You'll get over it.
    Emeritus - "Texas Proud"
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    2   0   0
    Jul 23, 2011
    21,358
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    Little Elm
    DONT: I'll explain.

    There are a couple of things you can do to get this done.

    1. There are a couple of devices you put on the top of a Macbook and it somehow reads your gestures and makes it touch screen. I stopped following that idea due to disinterest, but I don't know if any of them came to market.

    2. You can use an Ipad as a monitor for the Mac and yes it will work for touch screen. BUT DON'T. From my experience it's not nice. WHY? Because Mac OS in not built for touch screen and there are a lot of places to touch on Mac OS. It's not an iPad, it's a full blown operating system and your kids will hate it. Mine did.

    3. There are touch screen HDMI monitors out there that I've only read work with Mac OS, but the same principle applies in number two.

    The new Magic Tracpad Twos are great. They're also huge compared to child hands and there are a TON of gestures. There are third party apps that allow you to ad even more gestures. I'm confident that is all you will need and I'm sure they'll like it. Only takes a tiny bit of gettin used to.

    Not to mention, they need to learn how to interface between hand held devices and actual computers. It's very important they learn to type, as well.

    Last, I am selling a fully specked out 15" Macbook Pro with a 2019 keyboard that just came back from Apple. I need the 16" due to the 64GB ability. For not too much more than a Mac Mini, you can have the option between portability and desk top use, 32GB RAM, 2TB PCIE drive, and 2.9gz i9 6 core processor. I used it on 4 monitors at a time with zero issues.

    Let me know if you're interested, but whatever you do, get a proper mac, with the proper peripherals. Let the iPads be for fun easy going activity and the computer be for hard work, concentration, and disciplined focus. I find my kids view the two like that.

    God bless.
    Sell encyclopedias too? Lol
     

    candcallen

    Crotchety, Snarky, Truthful. You'll get over it.
    Emeritus - "Texas Proud"
    Rating - 100%
    2   0   0
    Jul 23, 2011
    21,358
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    Little Elm
    I can laugh at myself, and I really REALLY want to laugh at this, but I don't get it... Help.
    You went thru all the reasons not to do what he asked about and what he should do and then boom, you offer to sell him exactly what you said he needs. Hell of a sales pitch.

    Its funnier than the explanation is I guess.

    And ya, just poking a bit of fun.
     

    JColumbus

    TGT Addict
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    Jun 28, 2012
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    You went thru all the reasons not to do what he asked about and what he should do and then boom, you offer to sell him exactly what you said he needs. Hell of a sales pitch.

    Its funnier than the explanation is I guess.

    And ya, just poking a bit of fun.

    HAHAHA OK OK I get it. That is pretty funny. But I actually just HAPPEN to have what he needs and was open to selling it if the opportunity arose. I like it, and can still use it, but I do have to upgrade soon so I've decided to sell it for less than half of what I paid, less than two years ago.

    Anyway... You sir look like you can use a new set of encyclopedias! Let me show you what I got...
     

    Brains

    One of the idiots
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    3   0   0
    Apr 9, 2013
    6,904
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    Spring
    Solid advice.

    I've plugged a 22 inch HDMI + USB touchscreen monitor into my Macs, and it works like a mouse. You can touch things (mouse click) and you can swipe things (mouse click+drag), but after about a minute of saying "okay that's neat" you never touch the screen again - or at least I didn't. The Apple Magic Mouse for me just works better since I can point, click, drag, scroll, swipe, and gesture all in one spot.

    MacOS is not designed around touch, but then again Windows really isn't either. But, both will "work" with a touch screen - with caveats. To be fair, iPadOS and phones are really the only place touch works like you expect. I currently have that monitor plugged into my Windows 10 based little Lenovo PC I (occasionally) use at work, and I touch the screen once in a basically never.

    Further, I bought my 10 year old daughter an HP touch screen convertible (laptop), and she uses the touch screen pretty frequently - for games that make use of it. For anything else, she doesn't touch the screen at all.
     

    Big Green

    In Christ Alone
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    5   0   0
    Mar 5, 2018
    4,640
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    College Station
    The reason I want touch is for some of the apps. Basic apps that just want them to select the right answer with a tap. We will have a keyboard so they can learn to type and a mouse also, though not wireless as I’m sure it would walk off.
     

    Brains

    One of the idiots
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    3   0   0
    Apr 9, 2013
    6,904
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    Spring
    For that, touch would work fine. This is the monitor I have at work, it's actually pretty decent quality. I originally bought it to make a big Android tablet / kiosk for trade shows, but that ended up being retired so it found a use in my office instead.

    ViewSonic TD2230
    https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01DKPJVIS
     

    pronstar

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    Jul 2, 2017
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    Dallas
    Man when I worked corporate, my pet peeve was people touching my monitor. Which is funny as I type this post on an iPad LOL

    For some reason, my phone and iPad don’t show fingerprints as much as a computer monitor does. Prolly because it was designed for touching.

    Interesting tidbit:
    Lexus and Toyota were early touchscreen adopters, before smartphones.

    Customers dinged them for fingerprints in JD Power scores. So they went to a remote interface.

    Then smartphones came out.
    And then they were dinged for not having touchscreens LOL


    Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
     

    Brains

    One of the idiots
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    3   0   0
    Apr 9, 2013
    6,904
    96
    Spring
    Man when I worked corporate, my pet peeve was people touching my monitor. Which is funny as I type this post on an iPad LOL

    For some reason, my phone and iPad don’t show fingerprints as much as a computer monitor does. Prolly because it was designed for touching.
    Oleophobic (oil resistant) coating on the glass.

    Interesting tidbit:
    Lexus and Toyota were early touchscreen adopters, before smartphones.

    Customers dinged them for fingerprints in JD Power scores. So they went to a remote interface.

    Then smartphones came out.
    And then they were dinged for not having touchscreens LOL
    Personally I'd ding them more for crappy ECU firmware that fails the throttle wide open when it can't rationalize the throttle position. Kinda deaded some people and stuff.
     
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