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Rick Rizner, John Goddard
IBM has added its first integrated fingerprint reader to select models of its flagship thin-and-light laptop, the ThinkPad T42. The sensor, embedded in the lower-right palm rest, requires that you slide a finger three times across its small window to register it. The included fingerprint software then merges the swipes into one image ID. The system protects the laptop and replaces cumbersome passwords.
Like the sensor found on the Fujitsu LifeBook P7010D we tried previously, we found IBM's slide sensor a bit more time-consuming to use than the older contact sensor windows that most fingerprint- reader-equipped laptops use. It's harder to slide a finger across a tiny sensor three times in exactly the same way than it is to merely press a finger in the comparatively large postage-stamp-size window used by contact sensors. It took us five tries--15 swipes altogether- -to register our finger on...