Lots of people find that once they’re outside the touch optimized environment that the HP TouchSmart software provides, things in Vista are not all that easy to use with touch.

This is something we addressed with what we called a “Touch Optimizer” on the IQ770 (our first TouchSmart series). On the IQ500 series we initially left this program out of the factory configuration (the reasons would bore you, trust me.) Now we’ve brought it back as an update that you can get at the HP Support website: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareDownloadIndex?softwareitem=pv-66423-1&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&lang=en&os=2100&product=3752240

This utility will increase several “non-client metrics”, as they’re called in Windows developer lingo, to sizes that make things easier to hit with your finger. If I remember correctly, the tool increases scrollbar, close/minimize/maximize buttons and taskbar quicklaunch icon sizes. It also turns on single click for desktop icons so you don’t have to double-tap to launch programs from the desktop anymore.

Until Windows 7 arrives with better integrated touch in the whole OS, try this tool and see if it doesn’t get you 60% of the way there. Maybe even 80%.