zTouch™ Technology

zTouch™ is a Force Based touch screen technology. The basic operational principle is a touch screen system with sensors capable of accurately sensing the applied force of a user's touch or gesture and calculating the touch coordinates. One of the key advantages of force based touch screen technologies is that as the applied touch force is used for determining the touch coordinates, the touch system will, and must, also accurately know the magnitude of the user's touch at any given moment of time. The touch system output is therefore based on 3-variables; x- and y-coordinates and the "z-coordinate" (force level).

Many companies and organizations have explored the concept of force-based touch screen technologies over the last 30+ years, but few have been able to bring the theoretical concepts or laboratory prototypes into working commercial products. Where others have failed, F-Origin has succeeded.


The MyDevice Smartphone

F-Origin's earliest implementation was a 4" touch panel for a GSM SmartPhone. This phone was in many ways ahead of its time, featuring motion and touch control and a Java based OS, but was unfortunately only produced in a few thousand units.  Although f-origin is no longer targeting the mobile phone market, the product development from this product laid the foundation for the zTouch development and newest target market segments.

F-Origin has since further developed the zTouch™ touch screen product to allow for a broad range of product applications, such as POS and POI monitors, oversized touch monitors, indoor & outdoor kiosks, refrigerator and oven control panels, bezel and bezel-less designs and much more.

F-Origin's zTouch touch screen technology is built on three competence areas; mechanical design, sensor technology, and software / algorithms.

The mechanical design of a force based touch screen system must allow for a close-to-frictionless movement in the perpendicular plane (the z-plan) to ensure that the complete force (F) of the touch is directly transferred to the force sensors, here shown as a system based on four sensors (S1 – S4), where the touch force F = FS1 + FS2 + FS3 + FS4.  As the location of the four force sensors is known, the exact coordinates of the touch coordinates can easily be calculated. Any unknown disturbing forces, such as friction or bending would have a negative impact on the system accuracy. Interfering forces can be allowed for, as long as they are known, repeatable and can be compensated for.  

F-Origin's patent pending mechanical suspension designs and water seal solutions allows for optimal performing mechanical designs with a minimum of disturbing external forces.

To ensure high accuracy, the force sensor must be extremely precise, linear and sensitive. F-Origin has jointly developed a piezo-resistive force sensor that meets these requirements. This F-Origin Force Sensor (FFS) has a small footprint, supports linear operation in a wide temperature range, and can withstand millions of touches.

While the FFS force sensor capture the data and the mechanical design ensures an optimal transfer of the touch force from the touch media (touch screen, touch panel) to the force sensors, it is the zTouch™ software and underlying mathematical algorithms that ensures performance and accurate coordinate calculation in the system. The firmware of the default zTouch™ implementation runs on STM32F101 and STM32F103 family of ST Micro MCUs, however, other MCUs can be supported. 

The main tasks of the zTouch™ firmware are to record & filter the sensor data, optimize, compensate & calculate the touch coordinates, and to communicate the touch coordinates.

The zTouch™ architecture is highly flexible and supports touch systems using at least one (1), and up to eight (8) force sensors. The functional modules of the firmware includes data filtering and data correction, initial coordinate calculation, zero moment calculation and auto calibration, motion compensation, touch threshold determination and data export. Additional support functions, such as the initialization function allows for certain values and thresholds to be set or manipulated by user, or even the applications. For example the required force levels for a touch or a click. Specific end-user calibration module is currently not supported (as it is not required) as a standard configuration, although it can be if requested.

For more information and a downloadable technology overview whitepaper, please click here.

To view our design guidelines, please contact us.

More Information

  • Support for any type of touch: User input is recorded independent of what the user is touching the screen with, e.g., finger with or without glove, pen, stylus, credit card etc..

  • Durability:  Touch surface/lens is as durable as the system/application requires.  No membrane to wear so routine cleaning procedures and materials can be used without concern.

  • Environmental robustness:  Moisture/dust resistance as well as the ability to filter out and ignore weather and contaminants is another benefit of the design and positive impact to no membrane layer or  bezel-based optics and electronics.    Bezel or Bezel-less designs are available.

  • Optical Performance: Optical performance is enhanced compared to typical surface-based touch systems because there is no surface membrane to restrict light transmission. Better clarity and light throughput enhances viewing experience as well as potentially reducing backlighting thereby saving system energy usage as well.

  • Configurable force sensitivity levels: With most of the system’s intelligence resident in the software, it is simple to adjust force levels (sensitivity) for different users or applications. This is useful in setting the minimum pressure necessary to register a particular touch, gesture, or key press. For example, a light touch may highlight or select a key, while a harder press could be required to record the key press.

  • Lens or touch surface design freedom: As long as the lens/touch surface is rigid, any material may be selected. The touch surface could be made out of glass, plastic, or stainless steel etc. The touch surface can be an overlaying touch lens with a different size and shape or technically it could be the LCD module itself. The shape of the surface could also be non-rectangular and it may even have 3-dimensional features or topography such as raised or lowered areas for key orientation effects or Braille character support. 

  • Unique 3-D application input: The zTouch™ design also allows applications access to the force input levels, thereby providing support for “3D” applications. Faster acceleration by pressing an input key harder in a game or handwriting lines that vary in thickness are capable when the user increases the touch force.

  • Gesture Support: The zTouch™ touch screen will register single points, such as key presses, as well as line drawings and gestures, making this solution optimal for gesture inputs, drawing, and handwriting recognition applications.

  • Affordable: The zTouch™ technology is also very cost effective/competitive, especially for larger volumes, as the cost for unique components and sensors is comparatively low.

zTouch supports both real time and open operating systems. The operating systems supported by default include:

  • Microsoft XP, Vista and 7, including versions, such as embedded, 32 & 64 bit, Asian language versions, etc.
  • Microsoft Windows CE
  • Linux
  • OSX

Additional operating systems can be supported as needed. 

zTouch is also completely flexible in terms of physical interfaces. The default interface supported is USB, however, other interfaces can be supported as needed. The output data may be exported as HID compliant data or unique proprietary data as needed.

Examples of current interfaces suitable for zTouch (but not limited to):

  • USB
  • SPI
  • I2C
  • LIN bus
  • CAN bus
  • TTL
Please contact us to receive a copy of the design guidelines.

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