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Non-Apple Touchscreen Monitor MAC Mini Compatible

Can anyone point me to a list of non-Apple touchscreen monitors that are fully compatible with a Mac Mini? Thanks!

Posted on Mar 5, 2020 2:08 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Mar 10, 2020 7:36 AM

Apple don't explicitly support touch screens on Macs as indicated by QuickPost.


Saying that there have been the following two approaches.


  1. The use of pen driven tablets, some of which also contain an LCD display built-in to them, e.g. Wacom
  2. 3rd party touch screens typically originally designed for Windows but including Mac drivers.


The second category is clearly nearest to what you originally requested, these typically connect to the computer via both a screen display connector e.g. DVI and a USB connector. The USB connector is used to transfer the signals used to handle the touch screen aspect.


There even used to be a long time ago a Mac laptop which a company converted in to a purely touch screen Mac. (Looks like it still exists.) See - http://www.modbook.com/modbookpro


With regards to drivers for a Mac for using a touch screen with a 'standard' Mac see the following links.


https://www.touch-base.com/

https://www.beetronics.co.uk/download-driver

https://www.u-touch.co.uk/driver-downloads/

https://lilliputdirect.com/touchscreen-drivers


and many many more. Use Google.


I would however be concerned over the following.


  1. I suspect already many are out of date and might have difficulties running under modern versions of macOS and hence may totally fail in Catalina or future macOS versions
  2. Different brands of touch screen will likely need different drivers so check that a touch screen has a driver for the Mac available from the screen maker or whether there is an independent driver that supports that particular screen for the Mac


Note: Some screens and/or drivers may only support a subset of possible touch commands e.g. pinch to zoom, click, drag, etc. this might be done to how many 'fingers' it can simultaneously process.


It likely will not help but the trackpad on a MacBook or Apple's Magic Trackpad can be used for touch control but obviously not via the screen itself.

3 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Mar 10, 2020 7:36 AM in response to Eleuthra1

Apple don't explicitly support touch screens on Macs as indicated by QuickPost.


Saying that there have been the following two approaches.


  1. The use of pen driven tablets, some of which also contain an LCD display built-in to them, e.g. Wacom
  2. 3rd party touch screens typically originally designed for Windows but including Mac drivers.


The second category is clearly nearest to what you originally requested, these typically connect to the computer via both a screen display connector e.g. DVI and a USB connector. The USB connector is used to transfer the signals used to handle the touch screen aspect.


There even used to be a long time ago a Mac laptop which a company converted in to a purely touch screen Mac. (Looks like it still exists.) See - http://www.modbook.com/modbookpro


With regards to drivers for a Mac for using a touch screen with a 'standard' Mac see the following links.


https://www.touch-base.com/

https://www.beetronics.co.uk/download-driver

https://www.u-touch.co.uk/driver-downloads/

https://lilliputdirect.com/touchscreen-drivers


and many many more. Use Google.


I would however be concerned over the following.


  1. I suspect already many are out of date and might have difficulties running under modern versions of macOS and hence may totally fail in Catalina or future macOS versions
  2. Different brands of touch screen will likely need different drivers so check that a touch screen has a driver for the Mac available from the screen maker or whether there is an independent driver that supports that particular screen for the Mac


Note: Some screens and/or drivers may only support a subset of possible touch commands e.g. pinch to zoom, click, drag, etc. this might be done to how many 'fingers' it can simultaneously process.


It likely will not help but the trackpad on a MacBook or Apple's Magic Trackpad can be used for touch control but obviously not via the screen itself.

Mar 5, 2020 2:16 PM in response to QuickPost

Thanks for letting me know. I purchased a Viewsonic touchscreen on Amazon that said it was Mac compatible. After 3 hours of back and forth between Viewsonic and Apple tech support, someone at Apple, finally, told me it wasn’t compatible. What they didn’t tell me is what you just told me. Frustrating day. Appreciate the help!

Non-Apple Touchscreen Monitor MAC Mini Compatible

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