Tablet PCs have carved out a niche of sorts within industry and high-end businesses, but only HP has been aggressive enough to offer consumers this option via its TouchSmart range - see the TX2-1020ea.
Despite this, Microsoft has made much of the multitouch features within Windows 7. These range from the finger-friendly taskbar buttons to the ability to zoom in and out of documents.
Say you're reading a web page and want to zoom in, perhaps to make it easier to hit a link. You can put two fingers to the screen and move them apart, similar to the iPhone, and this will zoom in.
It's actually easier to use a two-finger tap: this will automatically zoom in to the width of screen you selected. It's also possible to quickly bring up the right-click menu - press and hold until a circle animation appears and the menu will pop up.
One potential hurdle is that if you're using Windows at its standard dpi setting then you'll struggle to hit the Close buttons, but it's easy to switch to 125% or 150% (type "dpi" into the search box and you'll be taken straight to the relevant part of Control Panel).
So is all rosy? Unfortunately not. We can't see manufacturers rushing headlong into switching their mainstream laptops to touchscreens, not least because they're expensive.
But with enough promotional money behind it, and given two or three years, touch could become an increasingly important part of our computing lives.
Part 10: Wireless that works
Part 9: Turbo Boost your laptop
Part 8: Hunting down those missing files
Part 7: Good news for gamers?
Part 6: Blu-Ray and displays
Part 5: The new XP mode
Part 4: Playing DivX and XviD files
Part 3: Will your PC actually boot any quicker?
Part 2: Raw performance benchmarks
Part 1: Good news for gamers?
Also see: The 30 Best Features of Windows 7