Can the laptop mouse be mastered or should I just use the old one with the cord?

The touch pad is only a rudimentary form of navigation, and the only reason it is on there is for space reasons. Even the tiny laptop mice is only that small to save space.
It is the only correct decision to get a proper mouse.

I’ve got a wireless mouse. I didn’t care for the laptop mouse and I don’t have a cord to worry about.

A new mouse will probably cost less than the postage of an old one.

I can use the pad mouse to put the cursor exactly where I need it, I even use it to draw things that have to have a 0px margin of error, but it takes practice, they will never be as good as a regular mouse or track ball mouse.

A mouse with cord is probably easier,

Trackpads can be mastered, but not easily. I plug a mouse into my laptop whenever I fire up Ryzom, partly for the precision, partly because it’s easier to right-click.

@poisonedantidote That depends. For most people, a $5–10 mouse will suffice. A good laser-mouse can run $100 though.That said, I’ve found mice that would work for most people at the thrift store for under a dollar.

@marinelife I’m a cordless guy. Get one with a nano-receiver and call it a day; just keep an eye on the batteries (which usually last at least a couple of months).

It takes about one full week of usage to get the trackpads, according to my mom and husband. We use the wireless if the trackpad is inconvenient for something in particular.

Try both.
Learning a new thing is a challenge.We can always use a challenge and win it over and feel proud of achievements, even as small as this.
It gives us the confidence to try other things/ challenges too.

@jerv You are right. I am behind the times.

I hate the touchpads on all of my laptops, but I can use them when I need to. Fortunately, when I use Logitech mice the setup routine disables the touchpad so that it doesn’t give me stray “mouse clicks” that can happen as I type on the laptop keyboard.

I’ve gotten extremely used to the trackpad on my laptop and I “mastered” it after several weeks. However, I don’t really play games on my laptop at all, so I don’t really know how difficult it would be to use a trackpad for that purpose. If you are more comfortable using a mouse, I’d suggest getting a wireless one so that there are no cords to get tangled up.

@mangeons Generally speaking, trackpads are good only for rough navigation and left-clicking. Many games I play require far more precision than a trackpad can easily manage, and some most require at least some right-clicking. Same thing for most graphics work; you need to get within one pixel, and trackpads are tricky to do that with.

Different folks have different needs.

When I first got a computer it was a laptop with a built in mouse pad, I had not used a computer before and found it perfectly workable, I guess it depends what you’re used to.

@jerv That’s what I suspected. Like I said, I don’t really do anything like that on my laptop so I wasn’t sure, but I figured it would be more difficult to play games or do anything where you needed to be precise with a trackpad.