Published in: Apple Mac

Apple’s Magic Trackpad 2 is a new and redesigned multi-touch trackpad that has a larger surface area than the previous trackpad, includes rechargable batteries and supports Force Touch, a technology that lets you do more with a single touch. For instance, you can press the trackpad to select a word on a web page, apply more pressure and it will pop-up the word definition.

Apple Magic Trackpad 2 costs $129 but it isn’t just expensive, it may not be compatible with your older iMac or Macbook. The Apple website suggests that the new Magic Trackpad 2 requires Bluetooth 4.0-enabled Mac running El Capitan (OS X v10.11 or later) and thus it may not work with MacBooks and iMac that are older than 3-4 years.

If you are looking to buy the Trackpad but are not too sure if it will work with your Mac, here’s how you can perform a quick check.

Does your Mac have Bluetooth 4 for Magic Trackpad 2

Click the Apple logo in the menu bar, select “About this Mac” and check for the version number. If it says 10.11, you’ve El Capitan. Next click on “System Report,” select “Hardware” underneath Bluetooth and look for the “LMP Version” in the report. If it says 0x6, it means you’ve Bluetooth 4 on your Mac and the Trackpad 2 will work without issues.

If you prefer the command line approach, open terminal on your Mac and enter the following command to know your Bluetooth version.

system_profiler -detailLevel full | grep “LMP Version”

The LMP (Link Manager Protocol) Version will be 0x6 if your Mac is equipped with Bluetooth 4 or 0x4 if it has an older version of Bluetooth. You should have also upgraded your Mac to OS X 10.11 (El Capitan).

There are inexpensive Bluetooth USB adopters, like the ones from GHS2 and IOGEAR, that will plug into the USB port of your Mac and bring Bluetooth 4 connectivity to even older models but they are not ‘officially’ supported.