Multipoint touchscreen

1. A touch panel comprising a transparent capacitive sensing medium configured to detect multiple touches or near touches that occur at a same time and at distinct locations in a plane of the touch panel and to produce distinct signals representative of a location of the touches on the plane of the touch panel for each of the multiple touches, wherein the transparent capacitive sensing medium comprises:

a first layer having a plurality of transparent first conductive lines that are electrically isolated from one another; and

a second layer spatially separated from the first layer and having a plurality of transparent second conductive lines that are electrically isolated from one another, the second conductive lines being positioned transverse to the first conductive lines, the intersection of transverse lines being positioned at different locations in the plane of the touch panel, each of the second conductive lines being operatively coupled to capacitive monitoring circuitry;

wherein the capacitive monitoring circuitry is configured to detect changes in charge coupling between the first conductive lines and the second conductive lines.

2. The touch panel as recited in claim 1 wherein the conductive lines on each of the layers are substantially parallel to one another.

3. The touch panel as recited in claim 2 wherein the conductive lines on different layers are substantially perpendicular to one another.

4. The touch panel as recited in claim 1 wherein the transparent first conductive lines of the first layer are disposed on a first glass member, and wherein the transparent second conductive lines of the second layer are disposed on a second glass member, the first glass member being disposed over the second glass member.

5. The touch panel as recited in claim 4 further including a third glass member disposed over the first glass member, the first and second glass members being attached to one another via an adhesive layer, the third glass member being attached to the first glass member via another adhesive layer.

6. The touch panel as recited in claim 1 wherein the conductive lines are formed from indium tin oxide (ITO).

7. The touch panel as recited in claim 1, wherein the capacitive sensing medium is a mutual capacitance sensing medium.

8. The touch panel as recited in claim 7, further comprising a virtual ground charge amplifier coupled to the touch panel for detecting the touches on the touch panel.

9. The touch panel as recited in claim 1, the transparent capacitive sensing medium formed on both sides of a single substrate.

10. A display arrangement comprising:

a display having a screen for displaying a graphical user interface; and

a transparent touch panel allowing the screen to be viewed therethrough and capable of recognizing multiple touch events that occur at different locations on the touch panel at a same time and to output this information to a host device to form a pixilated image;

wherein the touch panel includes a multipoint sensing arrangement configured to simultaneously detect and monitor the touch events and a change in capacitive coupling associated with those touch events at distinct points across the touch panel; and

wherein the touch panel comprises:

a first glass member disposed over the screen of the display;

a first transparent conductive layer disposed over the first glass member, the first transparent conductive layer comprising a plurality of spaced apart parallel lines having the same pitch and linewidths;

a second glass member disposed over the first transparent conductive layer;

a second transparent conductive layer disposed over the second glass member, the second transparent conductive layer comprising a plurality of spaced apart parallel lines having the same pitch and linewidths, the parallel lines of the second transparent conductive layer being substantially perpendicular to the parallel lines of the first transparent conductive layer;

a third glass member disposed over the second transparent conductive layer; and

one or more sensor integrated circuits operatively coupled to the lines.

11. The display arrangement as recited in claim 10 further including dummy features disposed in the space between the parallel lines, the dummy features optically improving the visual appearance of the touch screen by more closely matching the optical index of the lines.