I find it interesting that your criteria for selecting a laptop seem to be primarily aesthetic.

I would guess that you are in a small minority here on HN, with most people selecting based on price, feature-set, and possibly brand loyalty/aversion (i.e. "Never buying an Acer again!"). Even if they don't use the nib personally, it's quick to disable and then it's just a visual feature on the keyboard.

To be fair, the main brand that uses them these days is Lenovo and they generally ship absolute trash now.

I had one and broke the hinges just past my warranty period...

I'm also confused as to why anyone would find it functionally better than a trackpad.

One reason: once you are used to it, it is wonderful not having to leave the home row to use the mouse.

Instead of dismissing the trackpoint because of how it looks, try using it exclusively for a week to understand why people really like them.

Not OP, but I did give it a chance (couple of weeks) and I just can't seem to get used to it. I have no issue with alternative input types (I frequently switch between anything in mouse keys, trackpad, regular mouse and both finger and thumb operated trackballs), but I was just super inaccurate with the Trackpoint, the pointer kept flying off all over the screen it for some reason. Tweaking sensitivity/acceleration helped a bit, but not by much.

I can definitely understand the appeal - having a mouse on the home row is pretty damn cool - but damn didn't I have a good experience. Using it for a couple days doesn't mean you'll like it.

On the flip side if you use a Mac track pad for a week you’ll never need a track point.

I disagree. I have both a MBP and ThinkPad. I'm probably in the minority, but I prefer the trackpoint.

I also have both, and I love both. I'm about as fast with both, although gaming with a trackpoint is a positively joyful experience.

I doubt that.

Even though a Mac track pad might be the best trackpad out there, a trackpad has always been less than optimal substitute for a separate mouse, but being build in the device and always available made up for that gap in convenience.

For laptops, if the principle agrees with you, a trackpoint is a far superior device to even a separate mouse for almost all uses.

Yes, and it saves my joints to not have to stretch and move a mouse.

I found the Mac trackpad worse than those on other laptops actually - seems to somehow get in my way more and it's push down thing seemed far more annoying than the tap gestures common on other devices. Fortunately that switch is possible on them I believe, just seems like you're giving up a "feature" to change it...

Both work simultaneously with default settings, at least on the latest OS.

In a world where track points were widely accepted, you could go without the big track pad, and put the keyboard to the edge of the laptop, and not have to reach over a big wrist rest. Alternatively, you could make some much smaller laptops, with regularly sized keyboards (and probably overly wide monitors)