Red Hat Bugzilla – Bug 426865
Synaptics touchpad stops working intermittently
Last modified: 2008-06-16 22:57:35 EDT
Description of problem: At times the synaptics touchpad on my Dell Inspiron 8600 stops working. The pointer will freeze on the screen for 20 to 30 seconds and then will start working again for a few seconds. The problem usually goes away if I unplug the AC power and run on the battery. The problem usually returns when the AC power is connected again. An external PS/2 or USB mouse works normally, only the touchpad exhibits the problem. I've been running Fedora 7 on this laptop since it was released and the problem only began within the last week. I install Fedora updates as they are released, so I'm guessing one of the recent updates broke something in kernel ACPI support or in the synaptics driver. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): synaptics-0.14.4-8.fc6 kernel-2.6.23.8-34.fc7 How reproducible: Often but not always reproducible when run on AC power. Very rarely running on battery power. Steps to Reproduce: 1. Connect AC power 2. Boot laptop 3. Try to use touchpad Actual results: Pointer alternately freezes and then works for a few seconds at a time Expected results: Touchpad should move the pointer normally Additional info: I've cleaned the touchpad, checked the physical wiring, tried the Dell pointer diagnostics, swapped to an alternate HD with Windows XP. All indications are that the touchpad hardware is working normally. The problem seems to be something that changed in Fedora with a recent update. If other information about the hardware or software is needed, let me know what would be helpful.
Update: Based on suggestions I found from online searches, I tried booting with "noacpi acpi=off pci=noacpi noapic nolapci lapci=off" but this had no effect on the problem. On the remote chance that this is a hardware problem I called Dell support. A tech arrived today and replaced the palm rest and touchpad on the laptop. This had no effect on the problem. He arranged to have a new motherboard sent out and we'll try swapping that out when it arrives in a few days. I'll post an update once I know the results.
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Fedora 7 changed to end-of-life (EOL) status on June 13, 2008. Fedora 7 is no longer maintained, which means that it will not receive any further security or bug fix updates. As a result we are closing this bug. If you can reproduce this bug against a currently maintained version of Fedora please feel free to reopen this bug against that version. Thank you for reporting this bug and we are sorry it could not be fixed.