Another thing you can try is completely removing all touchpad related devices and software, and reboot, and see if windows can use the touchpad by treating it just like a mouse. If the touchpad work, then it's either a problem with the actual touchpad hardware, or maybe somehow a setting got flipped in the BIOS.
Personally I'd recommend Linux Mint, if only because I know it to work by default with my touchpad. opinions differ on the best one to choose but it's not really that important. in fact, I was bored and decided to fire up my old satellite 440CDX and found myself trying to use a non-existent touchpad on it instead of the trackpoint! Sort of funny, really.Īnyway, re the original problem- One thing you can try (to narrow down wether the problem is a software or a hardware one) is to boot a Linux LiveCD. In that case, find an external mouse and see the Dell Knowledge Base article Drivers and Downloads FAQs for more information about downloading drivers (the Dell Touchpad. I even went so far as to buy a portable wireless mouse just so I could avoid using the touchpad. When the Dell Touchpad tab is not listed, the utility that enables and disables the touchpad is not installed, and you cannot enable the touchpad without an external mouse. So, everytime I went to use the mouse, I'd subconcously start fiddling around with the area between the g and h key where the trackpoint would be (both my older laptops used a trackpoint stick).
I hated the touchpad on my new laptop when I first bought it- because I had never used a touchpad before. I can understand the 'used to it' argument!
