Sony Vaio VPCSB touchpad problems

Hello

I just bought a VAIO, and have noticed the touchpad behaving quite odd. Basically it like bumps when I move it horizontally - nothing is wrong vertially.

This is me drawing a line to explain a little better what the problem is:


As you can see it is not really a very straight line, because it "moves in steps" along the X axis.

I think the problem is driver related, since I can make it worse or better by changing on the overall sensitivity, or turn on/off mouse precision. I am using Win7 Home (OEM).

Anyone else out there who knows what this might be, and how I can change it?

 

Let me guess... Alps Touchpad?

 

Yes - that would be it. This is a common problem with Alps Touchpads?

 

I was *this* close to buying the SA3 from Amazon. I stopped in Best Buy yesterday to see if they had it on display there, but they only had the SC. I was shocked when I saw that it uses an ALPS touchpad. Alps is the absolute worst. Having owned a Z12 (which uses Synaptics) I was very surprised Sony switched to Alps.

I'm assuming here that the SA is also using the Alps. I'll grab the SA3 touchpad driver later and see for myself. If it is the Alps I'll no longer be interested. Yes the touchpad on a laptop matters that much to me.

Oh to answer the OP's questions, yes that's exactly how Alps touch pads are. I have used many Dell Latitudes, they're ALL Alps.

 

HERE IS THE ANSWER....

Just got off the phone with Sony Support...for those that have an Alps Pointing device for Vaio on a Win 7 machine...

Press FUNCTION KEY + F1+F9...you will see a pop-up appear that basically disables and enables your mouse trackpad. After you do this, move your trackpad and it should be enabled or disabled.

They explained that this happens from random software updates. Also, there is now way to do this from Win 7 OS. Apparently there is a way via the Vaio Support software loaded on the machine, but I don't use that bloatware. Hope this helps!!!!