A touchscreen is a display that can recognizes or operates on person's touch. Touchscreen provides all the user interfaces just with a touch. It eliminates the need of interfaces such as keyboard and mouse. So you can use a touchscreen for your PC display or in network
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Touchscreen Technology

Touch screen driver Software

Touch screen driver software translates the touch into the information that an operating system can understand. It is similar to the device drivers for interfaces such as mouse or keyboard.

Three types of touchscreens are available based on three different technologies.

Capacitive Touch Screen

In the capacitive touch screens, the screens are made up of a glass panel that is covered with a material. The property of the material is that it can store electrical charge. So the capacitive touchscreens store charge. Human body can also store charge. When you touch a screen with a finger, some of the charge gets transferred to the finger. The circuits at the corner of the system sense this decrease in the charge on screen. Capacitive touch screen system measures the relative difference at each corner and the spot where touch occurred, and then switches the specified information to the touchscreen driver software.

Resistive Touch Screen

The resistive touch screens also made up of normal glass panels. The glass panel is coated with three layers. The two layers conductive and resistive are kept apart with spacers. The third scratch-resistant layer covers the whole setup. When the resistive touch screen system is running, current flows through these layers. On a finger touch, the two layers get connected and change in electrical field occurs. The system calculates the coordinates of point of contact and passes them to touch screen driver software.

SAW Touch Screen

SAW (surface acoustic wave) Touch screens uses reflectors and transducers for sensing the touch. One transducer is placed along glass panel's X-axis as a receiver and one along Y-axis as transmitter. Reflectors are placed on the panel as well. Transmitter emits ultrasonic waves to receiver. Touching the panel absorbs the waves and system notes the position of touched event. The information is send to processing unit and touch screen driver software.

Capacitive VS. Resistive VS. SAW Touch Screens

Capacitive

Capacitive Touch screen systems transmit 90% light from the screen and deliver high quality image. Only touch the screen with finger or a conductive device. Outside elements such as water or dust do not affect the screen.

Resistive

Resistive touch screens transmit only 75% of light but cheaper than other two. Touch supports any point able thing such as pen tip and finger. Outside elements do not affect the screen but sharp images can damage screen's layer.

SAW

Surface Acoustic Wave touch screen panels transmit 100% light and deliver highest quality image. Any point able thing can touch SAW screens. Outside elements can damage the screen. SAW Touch screen systems are the most expensive.

Touch Screen Applications

Dr. Samuel C. Hurst invented the Touch screen in 1971 and since then it is in use in number of applications. Touch screens are used in heavy industry at large scale. The voluminous businesses where quick response and throughput are required touch screens are preferable over keyboards or mice. At this point the Touch Screens are available in numbers of information appliances, ATMs, portable game consoles, smart phones and PDAs.