studio xps 13 touch thingy isnt working

i dont really no know what to call it

the touch thingy above the keyboard just stop working, ive install the all latest drivers via the dell website and nothing

could any please help? thanks alot

 

Did you install the latest version of Dell's Notebook System Software?

 

yay it works now ty

 

its called the media buttons =)

 

What was the problem with it?

I sort of figured that they would work regardless of driver installation, seeing as it controls the wireless and also CD eject button, and it would be extremely retarded if a person couldn't eject the CD at say, after a failed windows installation.

 

I find the media buttons stop working randomly, especially after a sleep or hibernate. Am running all the last dell updates on a Dell vista 64 image.

 

yeh i got the dell vista 64bit too

not really sure how i broke it or how it fixed itself , i just turned it off and came back while later all was good cd come out ^^

 

It tends to randomly stop working. First thing is to try rebooting, usually that fixes it. If not, turn off the laptop, remove it from AC power, remove the battery, and then hold down the power button for 5-10 seconds. After that it should work again (yes this is the official dell "solution").

 

I thought I was losing it I have a 1640 that was doing the same thing notice I said "was" I turn my lappy of after the button froze and now I get no lights at all from the media button bar. Dell is replacing palmrest hope that fixes it, but it may be a bigger problem than that, seeing others are having same issue. Im running windows 7 by the way. Bios A06

 

Yup this works for me too. Weird how they stop working for no reason.

 

That's because the media buttons are capacitive. Over time, they will build up residual electrical charge to the point that they will stop responding to touch. When you power down, remove the battery and power, and hold the power button, this discharges the capacitors, so the next time you boot up, they should work properly.

I have a Studio 15 with similar capacitive buttons, and I've had to do the same once or twice.

 

Wow, interesting thread. The Media Button problem appears in the Studio XPS series as well? Wow, thought Dell MIGHT have learned something from the Studio 15/17 owners that have this problem...

 

This isn't the same sticky eject button issue. At least they did that right.

In this case, the capacitive buttons will basically fill up their electric capacity over time, and will not be able to respond to touch. A quick discharge fixes that right up. It takes quite a bit of time to build up so much charge, though (it's only happened to me twice since August), and it's just an inherent trait of all capacitive buttons, regardless of manufacture or design. I know a guy with an HP dv5t, and the same thing happened to him after several months of use. A quick 30-second discharge and it hasn't happened since.

 

This seems to happen fairly often (considerring I've only used this for 2 days) to me though not necessarily with all buttons at once on both Linux and Windows :/.