Among BlackBerry users I am a bit unique in that I have always primarily used a Touchscreen device, starting with the Storm 9530. So when it was leaked that the BlackBerry Torch would have both a touch screen and a trackpad, I was concerned over how to handle this on the development side, and confused as to why a trackpad would be wanted along with the touchscreen. Handling the duel inputs on the development side turned out to be rather simple, but the why stuck around a bit longer.

However after using the Torch more and more, the trackpad gets used a surprisingly often amount of the time. While the obvious advantage is in cursor selection, using the trackpad to navigate around the homescreen, or through menus is surprisingly good. It may seem silly to use the trackpad, when there is a touchscreen right there, but more often then not it is more natural, and more convenient to reach for the trackpad instead.

The best analogy would be how in Windows it is often easier to tab through fields instead of using the mouse. In the same way having the option of using the trackpad makes simple navigation quicker then just the touchscreen on its own. An input mechanism that first looked unnecessary, instead makes the whole experience better.