Arch Linux

dissimilation

Member

Registered: 2009-01-19

Posts: 3

[SOLVED] Touchpad issues with Eee 900A, only with Arch.

Hi guys, posting here because I'm having a hard time tracking down this issue.

I recently aquired an Eee PC 900A, which I have running the 2-09 arch build no prob, but I'm having one massively annoying issue with the touchpad under X.

Whenever I lift my finger and replace it on the touchpad, at anything but super slow speed (and sometimes even then), the cursor will jump, an in or so back..

Now I thought this might be a hardware issue, so I've tried booting into different distros (after trying tons of configs  for the synaptics driver in xorg.conf), and this dosen't occur in the Xandros distro that ships with the Eee, or in Eeebuntu..

I'm pretty certain it's not a  config issue, Eeebuntu uses hal, I've tried using hal, and dozens of xorg.confs.. I've also tried the zen-eee kernel for the 1000/901's, which is older, and still has the same issue.

So I'm sure this is a software issue, but I'm not sure which.. It even happens if I dont have the xf86-input-synaptics driver installed.. I'm not going to post my xorg.conf here, because it's irrelevant.. I've tried using tons, including the one that ships with xandros..they all change aspects of the synaptics driver, but none affect this issue.

Anyone else having this issue? Fixes, suggestions?

Thanks.

Last edited by dissimilation (2009-03-03 14:11:31)

Wittfella

Member

From: Australia

Registered: 2008-05-27

Posts: 462

Re: [SOLVED] Touchpad issues with Eee 900A, only with Arch.

Hey, I had the exact same problem and I believe its in the new elantech touchpad driver, hopefully it should improve with time.  For now you can solve it by adding this to your 'modprobe.conf'

options psmouse proto=exps

dissimilation

Member

Registered: 2009-01-19

Posts: 3

Re: [SOLVED] Touchpad issues with Eee 900A, only with Arch.

Wittfella, I've been beating my brains in over this one, thanks a ton..

That was exactly the answer I needed, big ups.. You made my day.

Much love,

nowahn

Member

From: elsewhere

Registered: 2008-12-05

Posts: 75

Re: [SOLVED] Touchpad issues with Eee 900A, only with Arch.

hi guys,

I had a similar bug on my netbook with the Elantech touchpad. I have reported a bug to the maintainer of the Elantech driver and I get a patch that fix it.

description of my bug:
with two fingers above the touchpad, tap alterrnatively with each finger on the touchpad.
- expected behaviour: the cursor does not move.
- actual behaviour: the cursor jumps sometimes to the left or the right.
this only happens when configuring the touchpad with synaptics (by defaults, mine is detected as a mouse)

is your bug the same than mine ?
are you using both the proto=exps option and synaptics ? (I still have the bug in this configuration)

if it is the same bug, I have submited the patched kernel to AUR

---

take time to daydream, inspiration comes ...

Wittfella

Member

From: Australia

Registered: 2008-05-27

Posts: 462

Re: [SOLVED] Touchpad issues with Eee 900A, only with Arch.

Yes that sounds like the same problem.  If you lift your finger off the pad and place it down again, the cursor suddenly jumps to the left or right.  In some ways its sort of acting like a tablet/stylus eg. the cursor moves to an equivalent position on screen as your finger on the pad.  But it doesn't happen every time, sometimes you can lift your finger and place it somewhere different and the cursor does not move.

Mine is configured with synaptics, and the proto=exps seems to fix the behaviour.  All other synaptic related options (tapping, double-finger scroll etc) work ok.

Thanks for the info on the patch, I'll check it out.