Formerly known a Remote Conductor, RC Trackpad is a productivity App based on a remote conductor to control your personal computer comfortably from your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch. The App was developed by the Seattle-based startup m3me, Inc., founded in 2009 by two former Microsoft and Google Software Engineers.
I am specifically reviewing the iPad release, but the app is also available separately for the iPhone as well.
Once you have downloaded the App onto your device (in my case, an iPad 2) you’ll have to first access m3me’s website from the computer you want to control to download the free Conductor Server software. This is what your iDevice talks to in order to sync and be recognized by your desktop. This process is very simple and took no time at all. Note that for this review I was using OSX Lion on my Mac and an iPad2 with iOS 5 Beta 7.
Once you launch the application it searches for any computers on your network which are running the conductor server software, if you have more than one just
select the one you want to have control over, enter the shown password on the PC and you are done. The first thing you will see is the Mouse Pad. You can customize it by choosing from the built-in images or selecting an image from your iOS Library. I should mention that I am not able to change the image for my Mouse Pad, however I don’t know if this is a bug or just because I’m running IOS 5 Beta 7.
From the settings menu you can also manage the settings for “Mouse and Gestures”, mouse tracking speed and network update rate and mapping/options for each of the one finger through 5 finger gestures. You also have access to a complete guide of all the supported gestures for quick reference and easy learning. You have Lion style gestures over 20 to be precise that can be mapped to any over 20 actions, also includes pinch to zoom, optional scroll inversion,
and momentum scrolling. Pretty cool!
OK, now with my finger on my iPad screen I moved the cursor to the last line that I wrote, and with the extended 72 key keyboard included in this App, Voila…now I’m writing this review from my iPad, simple as that.
By tapping the App Launcher button and you are given access every single program installed in your computer. They are laid out like the native app icons you’d find on your iOS device. Browse them using gestures and even use the switch option to control which one you want to pop in your main screen.
A media control function is also included in RC Trackpad HD’s robust feature set. Though I suspect most people (myself included) probably already have Apple’s Remote, this is a basic feature that is a must in an App like this. Perhaps this is a feature that may hold more appeal to the PC users who may or may not have a remote.
Finally, I want to take a moment to specifically touch on the robustness of the security in this App. From what I’ve been told by the developers, RC Trackpad is the ONLY fully secure trackpad / mouse app on the App Store! RC Trackpad was built from the ground up to be secure, and uses an SSL connection with AES-256 encryption to communicate with your Mac (or PC). That means ALL network traffic is encrypted. This is something to consider especially if you plan on using an app of this type over a public network.
In Conclusion
RC Trackpad is the best remote conductor I’ve seen in the App Store, it does what it’s supposed to efficiently for only $1.99. Who needs an Apple Magic Trackpad? There is a lite version that you can try out for yourself, which allows you to experience the Trackpad and basic Keyboard, but not the App Launcher and there are no 4 and 5 finger gestures.
