Thinkpad W520 - Touchpad intermittently working when using dual finger scrolling.

adlib_x · 05-17-2011, 11:47 AM

Hi all, I purchased a W520 a little while ago.
great machine - however.

Is anyone else experiencing problems with their touchpad?
I am finding the dual finger scrolling functionality on the touchpad problematic. it seems to work only intermittently, basically gets stuck or doesn't work at all sometimes.
sometimes when it doesnt work, if I use the scrolling function with the with the track point and then return to using it with dual fingure on the touchpad, it suddenly works again.
The touchpad works fine when using one finger, its only probalematic when trying to use the scroll function with 2 fingers.

I ask because I had an incredibly frustrating call with tech support today and they say there is nothing they can do,
even though i purchaced the extra 4 year on site warrantee, they refuse to send an engineer out.
because as when doing remote testing, everything appears to be fine on their end, even though for me its not fine.
The say they can only send out an engeneer if they can see a pysical fault on their end.

so I'm wondering if its a fault with the W520 or the thinkpad trackpad technology in general?
Ive updated the drivers, and set sensitivity to most sensitive and fiddled around loads, with no success.
ive even re-imaged the machine (yes)
its very amoying concidering the price of these machines.
thanks
adam

John Ratsey · 05-17-2011, 01:13 PM

Did you update the driver to the latest version released on 11th May? It reports these fixes but there may be other unmentioned tweaks.

Quote:

Version 15.3.2.0

(Fix) Fixed an issue where the response of click drag on ClickPad was not good.
(Fix) Fixed an issue where Two-Finger Double Tap might not work.
(Fix) Fixed an issue where the setting for TrackPoint as "Use advanced features only" was not kept after standby or hibernation.

John

commander · 05-17-2011, 02:34 PM

I felt the same problem. My machine is in a service, so I cannot report about drivers.

adlib_x · 05-18-2011, 04:18 AM

ok - think this fix may work
seems to be more responsive, working from what can tell about 90% of the time as opposed to 60%
(not good enough in my opinion, if compared to a mac book pro's gesture and 2 finger scrolling features)
although ill test it out this week and see how i get on.

chap at lenovo forum gave me this suggestion

Go into UltraNav settings, disable the three filtering options.

Under the touchpad settings, go to Smart Check settings, and disable Gesture Filtering, Edge Tap Filtering, and Scrolling Region Filtering.

its under mouse settings in the control panel

original link

tech support call centre folks should have known this.
think the chap i spoke to yesterday shaved a year off my life with stressing me out and going in circles..... thinking how much i just spent with the added (on site warranty) and them refusing to fulfil it.

warmonked · 05-19-2011, 03:19 AM

Hey adlib,
I have a T420s and have the exact same complaints regarding two finger and one finger edge scrolling. I also got the same advice from ColonelONeill on the lenovo forums. Edge scrolling works a little better after turning off the filters, but two finger is still completely broken for me.

It took me 30 seconds of opening a browser to realize it doesn't work. It's a bit disappointing to see that drivers (I assume it's a driver issue) released like this.

Colonel O'Neill · 05-19-2011, 05:05 AM

Supposedly, the touchpad works flawlessly under Linux, so my [conspiracy] theory is that Synaptics gimps UltraNav drivers. Perhaps some fruity influence there?

1. Disable UltraNav's two-finger scroll.
2. Get TwoFingerScroll.
3. ???
4. PROFIT

infinus · 05-19-2011, 09:32 PM

Brilliant!

LoneWolf15 · 05-19-2011, 09:56 PM

I haven't found gestures to work very well on my T420. Since I mainly use the Trackpoint, it hasn't been an issue, but I could see where it would be for trackpad users.

Even with the new driver, two-finger double tap doesn't work for me.

EDIT: Finally got it to work, but like most of the other gestures, it isn't very sensitive (making it inconsistent). While I like the surface of the new touchpad, it seems to actually work against gestures. Either that, or the driver is just crap.

warmonked · 05-20-2011, 02:08 AM

I've been using the app that colonel o'neill linked for the past few minutes. So far it is VASTLY superior to the ultranav drivers. It has options for smooth scrolling and some tapping abilities as well.

I would highly recommend people try it.

biff2bart · 05-20-2011, 05:16 PM

Thanks guys for this thread - you all just helped fix my #1 issue with my new W520 - yeah!