Touchpad Lag/freeze/buggy/jumping debugging

I decided to make this troubleshooting post about ours buggy touchpad behavior since there are many information spread across different posts in non-touchpad related topics.


Symptoms


Not all G73 are affected by this issue and the symptoms can be different for many users, but most of them are common as:

• The touchpad work perfectly for minutes to hours, then all of a sudden go really laggy.
  
• The touchpad refuses to move, pass or go after certain point, usually the center area.
  
• Just not respond to movements in certain directions.
  
• Some parts of the touchpad send the pointer to the right.
  
• It can jump around the screen.
  
• This issue can las for hours and is solved with a restart.
  
• Happens with/without synaptic driver, with multitouch both enable or disable.
  
• Sometimes even the cursor move by itself.

As part of my debugging analysis, I conclude all the problems of the keyboard and touchpad came with the BIOS update. I received my unit with 206 from factory. Upon received, I installed the touchpad driver 15.0.0.9 (non asus) to enjoy the two finger scroll feature (not available in asus package.... do not why!?!?!). everything was fine until update to BIO 209 when the problem appears, but, since I used to use mouse, the touchpad was not very noticeable. Now I'm using only the touchpad but I can't go back since I'm in vBIOS v93 with BIOS 211. By the way, my touchpad hardware ID is: ACPI/SYN0A06

The problems seem not to be attached to any specific driver version, since both me and others had reported using different from the official asus with the same buggy issue. I just tested many different touchpad driver packages (from asus and others), with two finger and without them, but the problem persist. The only thing that gives a little hope is that the Microsoft driver has no this problem but you lose all the synaptic features.

The drivers tested so far:

• 14.0.10.0 from asus (without two finger scroll enable in touchpad control panel)
• 14.0.10.0 generic from synaptic (without two finger scroll enable in touchpad control panel)
• 15.0.9.0 generic from synaptic (Two finger enable)
• 15.0.10.0 generic from synaptic (Two finger enable)
• 15.0.20.0 generic from synaptic (Two finger enable)
• 15.0.24.0 generic from synaptic (Two finger enable)
• 14.0.3.C Latest from synaptic website (Two finger enable)
• 15.0.11.0 from asus G73JW (without two finger scroll enable in touchpad control panel)

All of them has the same issue, which seem to be a problem independent of the driver version, since much of them are generic and work perfect in different laptop with synaptic built-in touchpads. By this, IMO, the solution won't be found in a custom synaptic driver specif for the G73. I'm currently using the JW touchpad drivers which as well as the rest of the drivers, the issue is present. This drivers set has no Two Finger Scroll (don't know why?) and to enable it I just use TwoFingerScroolApp which enable this function in all synaptic touchpads. The only reason I do not remove the synaptic drivers is because I'm addict to Two Scroll Finger feature, in addition to the touchpad behave weird with generic MS drivers,

Me and other here are stated the problems should be the the polling rate for the touchpad. I already test my poll rates and they are around 80 hz for the touchpad and 120 hz for the mouse. When the touchpad freezes, the rate freezes too and when the functionality return, the touchpad poll rate return to 80 hz. The point is, to touchpad stops reading the inputs and do not change the sensibility, is like working or not, but no middle points in this case. Also, I read elsewhere to change the poll rate may led to system instability since it also change the frequency of internal chips read the peripherals, leading to asynchronous components' communications.

All these issues are independent of the KBfilter installed (driver for the keyboard). Using the MS default generic driver or the asus one, the issues persists. The Atk also does not solve the touchpad problems because is just the app which controls both the Fn and lights keys. As observation, after removing the kbfilter, not keyboard function where lost and my touchpad feels a way smoother when I use it.

I realized when a use my g73 on my laps, the problem came often. When I put on my desk, the issue gone. Is like if you use the laptop in other position than horizontal (laps, bed, sofa) the touchpad issue return. I'm not saying if you move the laptop the problem appears immediately, but long periods on my laps the issue seem to be more frequently. But later, when I used to laptop in my laps/sofa, the touchpad retakes its jumping behavior and became (as always) useless.


Partial Solutions

Looking for a solution, I found a simple but partial solution (in addition to use a mouse). Just opening the Moodpad (from the taskbar touchpad icon->Synaptic->accessories->Moodpad) and leave it always visible, solve partially the strange movement. Also, you will notice the app shows pressure in areas different that the one are you actually pressing. In my case, use to happens when I press the center area my finger appears to the right and it can not pass the center of the touchpad. I can even see how the ghost finger is moving by itself.

Other way to solve this issue is just restarting the driver. Open the mouse properties->synaptic tab-> restart the driver (on the button). It solved, but the solution last for a while.

No way to override it from the control panel or device manager. I'm looking into modifying drivers or something about PS/2 conection wich seem to be the problem since removing kbfilter the touchpad feels better and no problem is shown without the synaptic drivers.


Tools

Mouse/touch poll rate checker

Two Finger Scroll Activation for Synaptic Drivers only

How change USB Poll rate


Asus Curiosity

This information was posted some weeks ago at Asus FAQ section for the G73 laptops.

For any update/solution I'll update the post often.

And Gary, if you read this let know the R&D guys take a look in the BIOS (206 vs 209/211), seems to be hardware controller problem more than a soft issue.

 

I've also messed around with various drivers and found that the HP Synaptic driver version 15.0.9.0 seemed to improve things for me, haven't noticed the annoying "sticking" since I installed it. It has all the gestures: 2 finger scrolling; 3 finger swipe; rotation and pinch to zoom, although I disabled zoom as it accidentally activated too often.

I'm running BIOS 211, the track pad ID is also ACPI/SYN0A06

 

I know it's been a while, but has there been an official fix for this issue?

Mkeeley, thanks for the info on the HP 15.0.9.0 drivers as this seems to have stabilized things for me. It was driving me nuts prior to the driver change. I think it even works better than previous driver.

 

This problem just occurred a few days ago for me, but it's getting worse. A couple of hours ago I had to restart because my mouse cursor was disappearing entirely. Given that the cursor disappeared, I can see why Asus is pointing to VGA drivers, but I don't have time to go through all the necessary troubleshooting right now.

Only a few days left on my warranty so I need to decide soon if I want this RMA'd or if it's even a possibility.

Other function I've lost includes some of the custom corner actions I enabled, specifically in the lower left and upper left corners. I'm also getting the ghost finger that scrolls on its own across from the left to the right. Always in this direction, it never scrolls right to left on its own. I'm slightly fascinated by that.

Thanks Nekki for the dedicated thread. I hope people can find it easily and maybe we can get some good info nailed down for this issue just like the keyboard lag people have been trying to do. Although I have this touchpad issue, I don't have keyboard lag, at least as far as I know right now. I'll certainly update if that changes.

 

I'm putting up a post about using a beta Intel INF package to perhaps fix this issue.

 

Really? The problem appeared in 209? I never had any GSODs with any BIOS. I guess I could go back to 206 and see if my keyboard lag goes away. I'm trying to remember what fixes there were. I think 209 fixed Fn + Esc hanging the computer which is no big deal. I had never pressed that combo anyway. The big issue I think was the performance dropping badly if your battery got below 40% and then not coming back up without a reboot.

 

New info about the touchpad:

Regardless Gary insists it's a synaptic problem, I tested many synaptic packages (non-asus-non-twofingerscroll of course) in my old (but still rock solid) asus w2pb. As you can guess, the touchpad perform excellent, with no lag/buggy/non-responsive strokes. So, why insists in look for in synaptics driver a solution if the issue is relative to system/controller of the JH itself. Keep in mind guys the touchpad work perfect for min to hours before to become faulty. It's like something in the control system which is making the driver become faulty.

Again, I hope all this information help to asus techs find the solution.

 

I tried Bios 206, 209 and 211 with even more Synaptics drivers as you Nekki (i tried every possible driver i could find) and it made no difference...
I cant say if its the Synaptics driver, some other Asus related driver/software or perhaps even hardware, but whats clear is: these problems only occur with the Synaptics driver installed, and the same synaptics drivers work fine on other laptops, they just dont work right on the G73 series, and to complicate it further, even on the G73 laptops roughly 40% users are problem free according to the poll that was posted here.

Whatever solution Gary/Asus is working on should really be released soon if theyre half serious about this, especially seeing the G73JW also "inherited" this problem as it is even noted in the review on notebookcheck.

 

i agree with you . when i use it on my laps touch pad become horrible but when i use it on desk . it works perfectly no issue at all .

 

I tried use my system without the synaptics drivers, but since TwoFingerScroll needs the drivers install to activate the two finger, at the end I'm coming back to synaptics. In addition, the touchpad with generic MS drivers perform awful. ... but works

 

Wish someone over at Asus updated everyone with this. Gary PMed me last week said that they have 2 devices with the issue being RMA'ed that they are going to look at it. Also stated that the JW doesn't have any complaints about this. Idk if that helps.

 

Are there any users who have factory Windows 7 installs rather than clean installs that experience this problem? I have a clean install of Windows 7 Ultimate running on mine. One person had a theory that it was to do with not running the Asus Windows 7. I can't imagine why that would matter, but I would like to know.

I am in the process of restoring the factory "Restore Partition" to my hard drive so that I can do a factory install and see if I get keyboard lag. If you have a factory install and experience lag, you would save me a TON of effort!

 

Jody - see my reply in the keyboard debugging thread. I had the problem with the OEM install.

 

I feel agree with this theory. I did many factory restorations and never had any problem with the touchpad, but when I did a clean installation with a Win 7 DVD and then installed Asus driver: Touchpad Lag/freeze/buggy/jumping...
For the Keyboard I don't know, I'm not a speed writer.

 

I don't think speed has anything to do with it. I get the problem doing typing speed tests at 45 wpm. That's pretty slow. I imagine I type much faster when I inputting my own work, but speed tests require transposing someone else's work.

I think I will make a ghost image of my c drive and then do a factory restore just as a test.

 

In my case, when I buy the g73, the very first hour I inspect the hard drive to see what bloatware were installed. Next, I removed the HDD to install my new SSD with of course, fresh win7 install. The system remains with no problems around 2 months. The issue become usual (around) the time the BIOS 209 showed up. I said around, because as I explain in the very first post, the issue appears after a while. So, not sure if the issue came exactly with the bios, a win7 update, driver change, but is my feeling after the many different configuration tested, the bios would be the problem. Probably I'm wrong. In this very moment, I'm using the touchpad and the sensitivity/response is excellent, as no problem/issue whatsoever. It's matter of time the touchpad became irresponsive.

So, I still have the original intact HDD so I should try, but since there is nothing but win7 and bloatware installed, I'm feel lazy to tried (no games, firefox, chrome, etc to try). I should try later, but not today since th touchpad is working .... so far

 

You sure? Looks like you dropped an "e".

 

not, i'm dyslexic


really, no keyboard lag so far, i'm lose keystrokes in mac, other laptops and even my ipod touch... it's my way

 

I just did a factory restore. Creating a ghost image of my existing C drive literally took hours. Throwing the original recovery partition back on the hard drive took minutes.

After a factory restore, it made no difference at all. The keyboard lag/missed keystrokes is exactly the same. Meanwhile, that's three hours of my life I will never get back. You guys told me it wouldn't make a difference. You were right.

Now to set up a restore of the ghost image I made and off to bed. Hopefully it will be restored by the time I have to go to work... in six or seven hours.

 

What about touchpad?

 

I don't really see keyboard lag, my issue is with the touch pad itself.

The touch pad locks up, thinks movements are zooms, moves very choppy if it's not locked up.

I did a fresh install of Win 7 (first thing I did when I got the laptop) and didn't notice anything really right off the bat. However, at the time I was told 206 had major issues and to get 209 on there asap, so I did.

I'm not sure if that's what caused the issue, but it defiantly happens in the 209 and 211 bios and man is it annoying. I'm debating selling it for 500-600 dollar loss just because of this issue unless it gets resolved soon. I like the laptop a lot, but this is a killer for me since I travel a lot.

 

I kept mine at factory and tried a few drivers but my touch pad just goes crazy sometimes. Its very annoying. I normally have moodpad on but lately, it doesn't seem to help anymore for me. tried with bios 206 and 211 (current 211).

 

don't do it. The G73 is a nice a powerful laptop. Regardless the touchpad issue, the system perform excellent, if your are updated. If your touchpad become choppy, just do a cold restart (in my ssd takes seconds) or just use a mouse. As everyone here with this issue, we want it solved soon, but it's nothing to kill the game performance of the g73.

 

I don't play games on my G73, I bought it as a portable development machine. One that will be powerful enough to run VM's and large scale applications while I travel. The thing is, imagine sitting on an airplane with this thing and having to use a mouse (there's no space as it is).

Plus when I move from room to room at work or client site, I have to drag a mouse around with me too now, ever try to walk around with the laptop, power charger, external hard drive, notebook/coffee/something else and a wireless mouse or even wired in that matter?

Or better yet, your in the middle of developing or giving a presentation an you have to "restart" because your $1600 PC doesn't have a capable touchpad... Stupid problem to have and live around if you ask me.

 

A messenger type bag would work, the Darkfield mini mouse would be awesome (You can use it on your palmrest if you had to) and works great on podiums.

 

with this arguments i totally agree with you. It's ugly as tech company, takes so long to solve this kind of problems. For gaming you can stick with mouse and everything works fine, but this is a LAPTOP, that means is an all-in-one. Mouse for this kind of devices is an accessory more than a complement. And it's frustrating one (or even both) of your input devices (touchpad and keyboard) are faulty. Common asus, make your techies deserve theirs salary.

 

I have a small wireless mouse. It tracks and works flawlessly when used on the palm rest. Consider it as an alternative to losing money on your investment. Ultimately I don't really care what you do, it's your life, money and laptop.

 

so how often does this issue happen on the JW models? and do the JW and JH share the same vbios ?

 

No, they dont.
G73JW use Nvidia & G73JH use ATI and they dont support the same vBIOS.

 

If you look at the posts from Hellcry (and others) there is a thread where he mentions he will be installing the JW touchpad on his JH. he has ordered it and is waiting for the part to arrive.

See if that works for them, then perhaps do the same.

 

Im going to do it (since i already ordered the part), but im having real doubts if it will help solve the problem, since as notebookcheck reported, the JW still has the same latency problems with the touchpad.
At least ill get a normal two button design if nothing else... although if it still causes missing keystrokes thereby forcing me to turn the touchpad off i wont really profit from it.

 

I've installed the newest driver from synaptic homepage (14.0.3.0) yesterday and downloaded also the Synaptics Gesture Suite Featuring Scribe. Also using the original synaptic two finger scroll function.

The Touchpad seems for me much better than the 14.0.1.0 driver now, no jumping, lagging etc. untill now.

It was horrible before, i always needed a restart to stop the jumping.

 

I'm not having any latency problem, when the touchpad both performs normal or when become choppy. Latency remains the same as low and poll rate remains stable at 80.

 

Do you have problems with just the touchpad or are you missing keystrokes too?

 

Just the touchpad. Sometimes renders uncontrollable. If you any miss-stroke in my post is not because keyboard lag... it's because my finger

 

Erratic touchpad is not what i was talking about .
The latency spikes are connected with some touchpad/keyboard conflict thats causing missing keystrokes, i imagine you shouldnt have latency issues if youre not missing keystrokes. Consider yourself lucky not to have such problems...

 

Betting this is old news, but I observed a repeatable instance of touchpad lag today. The symptom is when I touch the pad with my finger to move the mouse cursor to the right, it skips half the screen all the way to the right side.

Today it happened three times while I was loading 3DS Max 2011. I closed the program and reopened it to try inducing more lag. It seems that once 3DS Max was in memory, the mouse didn't suffer from skipping. The only other programs I had open were Chrome (2 tabs) and Thunderbird, both in the background.

 

I never noticed any problems with my keyboard and/or touchpad but for those who have problems you could maybe try this Synaptics driver here: Synaptics drivers

The version is 15.1.9.0

I installed it and everything is still working so....................who knows, maybe it will help you guys who DO have problems.
Good luck.

iemie

 

ok i too updated my self to stock driver to 15.1.9.0 . i haven't notice single issue till now . it is working perfectly the way i wanted . let see how long it work like this .

 

For me all drivers have this issue when the notebook is on my lap, not on the desk. Like it has a built-in gyro or something

Anyhow it's quite frustrating, I'm considering sending it for repairs - the only thing stopping me is that in that case I won't have it for a couple of weeks... :-(

 

ok it seam my touchpad is now working even on lap . yesterday when i was at my friend house i kept my laptop almost whole time on lap and touchpad was working correctly that is 6hrs

 

Hey dude. I tried out those drivers, but the touchpad went banannas on me again :S. I rested it on my chest while laying down. It took about 10 mins to go crazy. But guess what. 10 After the craziness it went back to normal which is an improvement. I wish asus could fix this soon.

 

I just found out that if i uninstall te driver for the touchpad the touchpad works great just that it doesnt have the side scroll or the 2 finger scroll

 

I have a request to you guys. This may sound funny, but when your touch pad acts crazy, hit it! No seriously, I hit it at a nice strength level with my finger and it started working again.

Hardware?

 

I didn't read everything here, but just came to say I'm having touchpad problems too! Sometimes the mouse just stays there while I'm trying to move it for 15 sec and after it works for 5 sec and starts again.... But I think 90% of the time it's in games.

 

I tried this no-geek solution for a while, regardless it solve partially the issue, I do not recommend since you are punishing your hardware. So far, with the latest 15.1.9 from driver station the touchpad is performing a way better. Jumping and buggy performance still occurs, but is less and when they come, is just for a short period. I recommend to do the upgrade, I was using this new set of drivers for more than a week and the result so far is satisfactory.





But I got a better solution:




I bought a microsoft mouse 4000 w/ bluetrack technology. I can say, it works everywhere, even over the g73's palm rest and the wireless usb receiver is way one of the smallest I ever tried.

When the jumping touchpad show starts, just switch to mouse and I still can use/play on the bed, on the floor, on a towel by the door, in the tub, in the car, up against the my laps....

 

Logitech MX Performance ownz yuor impotent m$ blutrakzor baloney!!!

 

sorry, I don't have 9 fingers per hand



Back to topic:

Talking with some who own the asus K52, he has the jumping touchpad issue as well as the g73. He described me exactly the same problem with cursor randomly jumping around. Seem to be the problem spread across the all the current asus laptop line up.

 

You are just realizing this now?! This is OLD info, and has been discussed in length in several of the lag discussions. Please catch up.

PS - pwnd!!

 

Its just an old Asus habbit... They make laptops with all these problems and see if anyone will still buy them. People buy them so they make new ones with the exact same problems which still sell just a well .
Theres a reason their laptops are cheaper... Its becouse they use cheaper (and less) hardware to make them - like their GPUs, which are all significantly wider than at their competitors (and wider PCBs are cheaper becouse it means less layers, more heat, better chance of it frying sooner). With technology you (almost) always get what you pay for .