What is driving the trend for companies to install large touch screen displays? The short answer is that it is a mix of improved functionality and user acceptance…
- With Microsoft Windows 10 touch screens are properly supported. Plug & Play HID drivers for touch screens have been around for a while but with Windows 10 it is genuinely possible to just have a touch screen, no mouse or keyboard is required. Just to make this point clear, it is not only the driver support for touch screen but also that Windows 10 enables touch screen users to work in ‘tablet mode’, this provides a virtual keyboard and full touch interface functionality.
- There is an increase in the number of applications that work well with touch screens and even a few that absolutely require them, for example digital whiteboard and way-finding. Take for example an application like Trello, an excellent collaborative tool for project organization, with an extension application from Cnverg it becomes well adapted to large touch displays. Also, back to Windows 10, using the new Edge browser from Microsoft users can annotate any web page, given that many applications now run within browsers that enable considerable scope for touch screen use.
- Large displays & support for 4K resolution with touch have made affordable high quality solutions possible. There is simply no comparison between the image quality and usability of a large, bright, high resolution LCD display which can be used in a normally lit room compared to projection which is lower resolution, often requires dimmer lighting and if it support interactivity it is lower accuracy.
- Smartphones and tablets have educated everyone to use touch screens, there is no learning curve for people to use a large touch screen as they are totally familiar with them from small screens. It is very reasonable to claim that touch screens are intuitive, more so now that people are familiar with them.