Hi, anyone else with this issue?

Every now and then the Synaptics touchpad becomes "wildly off the
mark"...I'd move it a little but the pointer goes way across the
screen! Worse, it doesn't simply land in a regular manner such that I
can recalibrate my own behavior in response to the sudden change in its
behavior. No, I'd touch the pad again, and the pointer would "shiver"
as if unsure whether I'd touched it, moved it, or which direction it's
supposed to go, and how far...this weird business usually happens with
the hard drive on a constant, steady whirl in the background, even
though Task Manager reports only 2% of the CPU (early last year's 1.6
Mobile Pentium, though I have 1GB of RAM).

Basically, the touchpad behaves erratically, almost epileptically, like
it's spazzin' out...this lasts for a few minutes, and then it's okay
again....

In news:1163399915.424113.238740@k70g2000cwa.googlegr oups.com,
Prisoner at War had this to say:

My reply is at the bottom of your sent message:

> Hi, anyone else with this issue?
>
> Every now and then the Synaptics touchpad becomes "wildly off the
> mark"...I'd move it a little but the pointer goes way across the
> screen! Worse, it doesn't simply land in a regular manner such that I
> can recalibrate my own behavior in response to the sudden change in
> its behavior. No, I'd touch the pad again, and the pointer would
> "shiver" as if unsure whether I'd touched it, moved it, or which
> direction it's supposed to go, and how far...this weird business
> usually happens with the hard drive on a constant, steady whirl in
> the background, even though Task Manager reports only 2% of the CPU
> (early last year's 1.6 Mobile Pentium, though I have 1GB of RAM).
>
> Basically, the touchpad behaves erratically, almost epileptically,
> like it's spazzin' out...this lasts for a few minutes, and then it's
> okay again....


Try adjusting sensitivity, hardware acceleration, and speed. No known exact
science for it. *grins* Sometimes they wander about of their own volition
and become nomadic pointing devices. Usually just slowing things down a bit
takes care of it.

--
Galen - MS MVP - Windows (Shell/User & IE)
http://dts-l.org/ http://kgiii.info/

"Chance has put in our way a most singular and whimsical problem, and
its solution is its own reward." - Sherlock Holmes

In news:1163399915.424113.238740@k70g2000cwa.googlegr oups.com,
Prisoner at War had this to say:

My reply is at the bottom of your sent message:

> Hi, anyone else with this issue?
>
> Every now and then the Synaptics touchpad becomes "wildly off the
> mark"...I'd move it a little but the pointer goes way across the
> screen! Worse, it doesn't simply land in a regular manner such that I
> can recalibrate my own behavior in response to the sudden change in
> its behavior. No, I'd touch the pad again, and the pointer would
> "shiver" as if unsure whether I'd touched it, moved it, or which
> direction it's supposed to go, and how far...this weird business
> usually happens with the hard drive on a constant, steady whirl in
> the background, even though Task Manager reports only 2% of the CPU
> (early last year's 1.6 Mobile Pentium, though I have 1GB of RAM).
>
> Basically, the touchpad behaves erratically, almost epileptically,
> like it's spazzin' out...this lasts for a few minutes, and then it's
> okay again....


Try adjusting sensitivity, hardware acceleration, and speed. No known exact
science for it. *grins* Sometimes they wander about of their own volition
and become nomadic pointing devices. Usually just slowing things down a bit
takes care of it.

--
Galen - MS MVP - Windows (Shell/User & IE)
http://dts-l.org/ http://kgiii.info/

"Chance has put in our way a most singular and whimsical problem, and
its solution is its own reward." - Sherlock Holmes

Galen wrote:
>
>
> <SNIP>
>
>
> Try adjusting sensitivity, hardware acceleration, and speed. No known exact
> science for it. *grins* Sometimes they wander about of their own volition
> and become nomadic pointing devices. Usually just slowing things down a bit
> takes care of it.

Thanks for the tip, but I've tried that already. No, this thing just
goes "epileptic" sometimes. Hasn't anything to do with my speed,
though, like I said, there seems to be a correlation with the hard disk
spinning away in the background (doing what I have no idea since CPU
usage is at 2%).

So I'm not the only one? This is a characteristic of the hardware?
"Nomadic pointing devices"...heh....

> --
> Galen - MS MVP - Windows (Shell/User & IE)
> http://dts-l.org/ http://kgiii.info/
>
> "Chance has put in our way a most singular and whimsical problem, and
> its solution is its own reward." - Sherlock Holmes

Galen wrote:
>
>
> <SNIP>
>
>
> Try adjusting sensitivity, hardware acceleration, and speed. No known exact
> science for it. *grins* Sometimes they wander about of their own volition
> and become nomadic pointing devices. Usually just slowing things down a bit
> takes care of it.

Thanks for the tip, but I've tried that already. No, this thing just
goes "epileptic" sometimes. Hasn't anything to do with my speed,
though, like I said, there seems to be a correlation with the hard disk
spinning away in the background (doing what I have no idea since CPU
usage is at 2%).

So I'm not the only one? This is a characteristic of the hardware?
"Nomadic pointing devices"...heh....

> --
> Galen - MS MVP - Windows (Shell/User & IE)
> http://dts-l.org/ http://kgiii.info/
>
> "Chance has put in our way a most singular and whimsical problem, and
> its solution is its own reward." - Sherlock Holmes

"Prisoner at War" <prisoner_at_war******.com> wrote in message
news:1163434531.164878.42040@e3g2000cwe.googlegrou ps.com
>> <SNIP>
>
> Thanks for the tip, but I've tried that already. No, this thing just
> goes "epileptic" sometimes. Hasn't anything to do with my speed,
> though, like I said, there seems to be a correlation with the hard
> disk spinning away in the background (doing what I have no idea since
> CPU usage is at 2%).
>
> So I'm not the only one? This is a characteristic of the hardware?
> "Nomadic pointing devices"...heh....

I have lots of weird things happening if I have tap to click turned on.
Have you tried turning this off and watching what happens? Also do you
have an external optical mouse connected? As those things occationally
goes spastic on some surfaces. Yes I use them and I am thinking about
going back to the old style ball rolling mice.

--
Bill

"Prisoner at War" <prisoner_at_war******.com> wrote in message
news:1163434531.164878.42040@e3g2000cwe.googlegrou ps.com
>> <SNIP>
>
> Thanks for the tip, but I've tried that already. No, this thing just
> goes "epileptic" sometimes. Hasn't anything to do with my speed,
> though, like I said, there seems to be a correlation with the hard
> disk spinning away in the background (doing what I have no idea since
> CPU usage is at 2%).
>
> So I'm not the only one? This is a characteristic of the hardware?
> "Nomadic pointing devices"...heh....

I have lots of weird things happening if I have tap to click turned on.
Have you tried turning this off and watching what happens? Also do you
have an external optical mouse connected? As those things occationally
goes spastic on some surfaces. Yes I use them and I am thinking about
going back to the old style ball rolling mice.

--
Bill

BillW50 wrote:
>
>
> I have lots of weird things happening if I have tap to click turned on.
> Have you tried turning this off and watching what happens? Also do you
> have an external optical mouse connected? As those things occationally
> goes spastic on some surfaces. Yes I use them and I am thinking about
> going back to the old style ball rolling mice.

No, no peripherals plugged in, but maybe it's a tap-to-click issue, as
your suggest. I'd check that out -- but I'd have to wait for the next
time it decides to spazz out, which is irregular, though often enough
to constitute a major annoyance. But when it does spazz out again, I'd
have a hard time getting into the Control Panel!

> --
> Bill

BillW50 wrote:
>
>
> I have lots of weird things happening if I have tap to click turned on.
> Have you tried turning this off and watching what happens? Also do you
> have an external optical mouse connected? As those things occationally
> goes spastic on some surfaces. Yes I use them and I am thinking about
> going back to the old style ball rolling mice.

No, no peripherals plugged in, but maybe it's a tap-to-click issue, as
your suggest. I'd check that out -- but I'd have to wait for the next
time it decides to spazz out, which is irregular, though often enough
to constitute a major annoyance. But when it does spazz out again, I'd
have a hard time getting into the Control Panel!

> --
> Bill

"Prisoner at War" <prisoner_at_war******.com> wrote in message
news:1163441719.280332.99800@i42g2000cwa.googlegro ups.com
> BillW50 wrote:
>>
>> I have lots of weird things happening if I have tap to click turned
>> on. Have you tried turning this off and watching what happens? Also
>> do you have an external optical mouse connected? As those things
>> occationally goes spastic on some surfaces. Yes I use them and I am
>> thinking about going back to the old style ball rolling mice.
>
> No, no peripherals plugged in, but maybe it's a tap-to-click issue, as
> your suggest. I'd check that out -- but I'd have to wait for the next
> time it decides to spazz out, which is irregular, though often enough
> to constitute a major annoyance. But when it does spazz out again,
> I'd have a hard time getting into the Control Panel!

I can't find my tap to click enabled/disabled in the control panel. And
mine is a Synaptics Touchpad as well. The only place to disable mine is
right click on the icon in the system tray (by the clock). I keep mine
off all of the time, but after a reboot it gets turned on once again. I
don't remember that happening before. But it could have, since this
laptop is on 24/7 normally.

--
Bill

"Prisoner at War" <prisoner_at_war******.com> wrote in message
news:1163441719.280332.99800@i42g2000cwa.googlegro ups.com
> BillW50 wrote:
>>
>> I have lots of weird things happening if I have tap to click turned
>> on. Have you tried turning this off and watching what happens? Also
>> do you have an external optical mouse connected? As those things
>> occationally goes spastic on some surfaces. Yes I use them and I am
>> thinking about going back to the old style ball rolling mice.
>
> No, no peripherals plugged in, but maybe it's a tap-to-click issue, as
> your suggest. I'd check that out -- but I'd have to wait for the next
> time it decides to spazz out, which is irregular, though often enough
> to constitute a major annoyance. But when it does spazz out again,
> I'd have a hard time getting into the Control Panel!

I can't find my tap to click enabled/disabled in the control panel. And
mine is a Synaptics Touchpad as well. The only place to disable mine is
right click on the icon in the system tray (by the clock). I keep mine
off all of the time, but after a reboot it gets turned on once again. I
don't remember that happening before. But it could have, since this
laptop is on 24/7 normally.

--
Bill

"Prisoner at War" <prisoner_at_war******.com> wrote in
news:1163399915.424113.238740@k70g2000cwa.googlegr oups.com:

> Hi, anyone else with this issue?
>

My Gateway notebook's touchpad (same company) does this, occasionally. I
clean the surface with alcohol to remove the film of finger and coffee and
those little buns my breakfast restaurant has and it works fine after that.

Look at the Synaptic tiny icon over in the lower right tray. Do you see
any pixels showing green on it when nothing is touching the pad? You might
also open the pad control panel by right clicking on it and reducing the
sensitivity of the pad a few notches.

Also be informed my ham radio transmitter drives it crazy, if you're around
any strong RF sources. Keying the transmitter sometimes drives it right
off the screen. Keep Bluetooth, wireless, cellular transmitters away from
it and see if the problem goes away.



Larry
--
My calendar must be wrong....
In all the stores, it's ALREADY Christmas!

"Prisoner at War" <prisoner_at_war******.com> wrote in
news:1163399915.424113.238740@k70g2000cwa.googlegr oups.com:

> Hi, anyone else with this issue?
>

My Gateway notebook's touchpad (same company) does this, occasionally. I
clean the surface with alcohol to remove the film of finger and coffee and
those little buns my breakfast restaurant has and it works fine after that.

Look at the Synaptic tiny icon over in the lower right tray. Do you see
any pixels showing green on it when nothing is touching the pad? You might
also open the pad control panel by right clicking on it and reducing the
sensitivity of the pad a few notches.

Also be informed my ham radio transmitter drives it crazy, if you're around
any strong RF sources. Keying the transmitter sometimes drives it right
off the screen. Keep Bluetooth, wireless, cellular transmitters away from
it and see if the problem goes away.



Larry
--
My calendar must be wrong....
In all the stores, it's ALREADY Christmas!

On 12 Nov 2006 22:38:35 -0800, Prisoner at War wrote:

> Hi, anyone else with this issue?
>
> Every now and then the Synaptics touchpad becomes "wildly off the
> mark"...I'd move it a little but the pointer goes way across the
> screen! Worse, it doesn't simply land in a regular manner such that I
> can recalibrate my own behavior in response to the sudden change in its
> behavior. No, I'd touch the pad again, and the pointer would "shiver"
> as if unsure whether I'd touched it, moved it, or which direction it's
> supposed to go, and how far...this weird business usually happens with
> the hard drive on a constant, steady whirl in the background, even
> though Task Manager reports only 2% of the CPU (early last year's 1.6
> Mobile Pentium, though I have 1GB of RAM).
>
> Basically, the touchpad behaves erratically, almost epileptically, like
> it's spazzin' out...this lasts for a few minutes, and then it's okay
> again....

Suggestions:
Clean the touchpad.

Try reinstalling the driver. If an update is available, might give that a
try. Download the Synaptics driver from the OEM site for your computer
instead of Synaptic. Or vice versa. I've had varying degrees of success
from both sources.

--
Sharon F
MS-MVP ~ Windows Shell/User

On 12 Nov 2006 22:38:35 -0800, Prisoner at War wrote:

> Hi, anyone else with this issue?
>
> Every now and then the Synaptics touchpad becomes "wildly off the
> mark"...I'd move it a little but the pointer goes way across the
> screen! Worse, it doesn't simply land in a regular manner such that I
> can recalibrate my own behavior in response to the sudden change in its
> behavior. No, I'd touch the pad again, and the pointer would "shiver"
> as if unsure whether I'd touched it, moved it, or which direction it's
> supposed to go, and how far...this weird business usually happens with
> the hard drive on a constant, steady whirl in the background, even
> though Task Manager reports only 2% of the CPU (early last year's 1.6
> Mobile Pentium, though I have 1GB of RAM).
>
> Basically, the touchpad behaves erratically, almost epileptically, like
> it's spazzin' out...this lasts for a few minutes, and then it's okay
> again....

Suggestions:
Clean the touchpad.

Try reinstalling the driver. If an update is available, might give that a
try. Download the Synaptics driver from the OEM site for your computer
instead of Synaptic. Or vice versa. I've had varying degrees of success
from both sources.

--
Sharon F
MS-MVP ~ Windows Shell/User