Dell Touchpad Driver on Toshiba Lappy

[VinDSL]

I'm on a roll now!

Upgraded my Toshiba A215-S4807 RAM to 4GB yesterday (4GB Readyboost too). Works great!

Today, I decided to tackle some touchpad & mouse problems...

The touchpad has NEVER worked right on this lappy, so I bought a wireless mouse, and it didn't work right either.

This Toshiba came with an ALPS touchpad (and drivers). I hated it, right out of the box. No amount of fiddling around made it any better!

About a week after I bought this, I did a Windows Update, and MS decided I had a Synaptics touchpad, not an ALPS. The Synaptics drivers seemed to work better, as far as sensitivity goes, but it had NO features available - no scrolling - nothing. I figured, WTF?

About a week later, I bought a wireless notebook mouse. That solved the problem, but for some reason, the motion speed setting wouldn't save. That is, every time I [re]booted, I had to speed up the mouse motion. Once again, I figured, WTF?

For about a month, I rolled the drivers back n' forth between the ALPS and Synaptics version, but they both sucked... and the mouse motion thing continued to be a PITA!

Anyway, you get the picture! Funny what you get used to...

Tonight I got serious about fixing all this BS, once and for all, and I got it aced! WOOT!

Toshiba users: COMPARE THE DELL FEATURE-SET TO YOUR ALPS DRIVER

I know there aren't a lot of Toshiba users in these threads, but you never know who's lurking...

The trick was to remove the Synaptics drivers entirely from this machine, and the factory ALPS drivers, and the wireless mouse Set Point drivers - and start from scratch! The thing is, I didn't know where to get ALPS drivers that would work - I certainly didn't want to download them from Toshiba!

That's when I ran across this: http://ftp.us.dell.com/input/R140031.EXE

LoL! Dell ALPS drivers!!!

A guy in some thread said:

It worked for my friend when having problems with the official ALPS driver. and he didn't have a Dell computer.

Bottom line is: Not only do these Dell drivers work great on my Toshiba, but it added a lot of functionality, like the ability to have the touchpad disabled with a USB mouse attached. Plus, Vista boots faster, and uses less memory (2.5GB free @ desktop).

Speaking of mouses, removing the wireless mouse drivers also fixed my mouse motion problem. I guess they were conflicting with the Vista drivers. :thumbsup:

 

[VinDSL]

Here's another interesting tid-bit for Toshiba owners.. :light:

I noticed that my Toshiba Flash Cards (drop-down menu for the function keys) quit working a while back, after an update.

Didn't really bother me, since they're kind of a nuisance anyway... but curious minds need to know!

Ran all over the web - lots of ppl have the same problem - nobody had a cure.

At wit's end, I deleted everything out of registry, doing with 'flashcard' and reinstalled it - nada!

Then, I started thinking, the Toshiba 'Value Added Package' adds all those buttons and menues to everything, so I reinstalled that - bingo!

I think the 'problem' was the installer. VAP is huge, like 38MB compressed - and the installer 'stalls' several times during the update, making you sorta think it's done - then a minute later, it does some more stuff, and so on, and so forth. Sooooo, I think I accidentally exited out of the upgrade, the first time I did it, before it was completed. The installer doesn't give you any indication what its doing in the background!

Sorry for boring you non-Toshiba types, but somebody might Google this thread and find it useful!

 

[PCNewb]

Bump for later!

I've had touchpad issues on my HP forever, but mine may be a bigger issue. Have tried many drivers, which install, but the touchpad does nothing / has no response at all. There isnt even a device found in the hardware. Hrm.

 

[fire400]

...Toshiba laptops, not a big fan of them. I'm sure many would agree on my part and would only purchase a laptop from Toshiba/vendor/etc. if there were a special deal going on. Otherwise, for years Toshiba laptops have been bumping into one too many unnecessary problems after the other with final production(s), up to the point until your notebook becomes utterly useless in it's so far (un-anticipating) defective state(s), that you'd rather throw it away than continuing to service it or have it serviced.

If Toshiba is reading this, "your laptops suck, and people will settle for better."

Good luck all~

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: fire400
...Toshiba laptops, not a big fan of them...

Do tell! And, what do you like?

Let me guess...

Um... Sager and Lenovo, right - maybe Budweiser?

 

[fire400]

Originally posted by: VinDSL

Originally posted by: fire400
...Toshiba laptops, not a big fan of them...

Do tell! And, what do you like?

Let me guess...

Um... Sager and Lenovo, right - maybe Budweiser?

Sager, more than Lenovo. I don't like how Lenovo took over IBM's Thinkpad's, they're just not the same anymore, and by that I don't necessarily mean better..

Budweiser, I don't drink, thanks.

You gotta be honest, go to Office Depot and look at their laptops. I mean, sure they look professional and sleek, Toshiba's. But if you try to compare them with the other notebooks, there's something missing about them, like the quality is there but it's not truly there at the same time. You get the notion that once you've done the research, the Toshiba ones and it's lines aren't going to cut it unless you are abolutely dead-serious that the specific model you're looking at as the qualities and features you want with a fairly decent price tag. Of course if you've got money to throw away, you're going to consider a Toshiba, regardless.

I like Sagernotebooks. The 'current' lines they offer for their 14.1's and 15's are much more reasonable than a Toshiba that's probably going to have a bunch of broken holes in it anyway.

Acer is next to garbage when it comes to laptops by the way. Each time they release a new series, I congratulate them, that they're a couple percent closer to reliability and are catching up pretty fast, but are still behind in ultimate quality.

Gateway and Sony are at the top of the list.

 

[VinDSL]

Well, Jeepers, I guess I should have bought a better lappy... like a Gateway/Acer/eMachine/Packard Bell!

Me and my Toshy are sitting in Charlotte/Douglas International right now, charging its battery, and WiFi'ing. We've traveled 3,000 miles today, with another 1,000 to go.

Kinda risky behaviour, don't you think?

BTW, I've been using the touchpad all day, and it absolutely, positively, 101% took care of the problem.

LoL! Ever tried to use a touchpad in the tail of a Canadair Regional Jet? Bwahahahaha!

This touchpad rocks now!!!

 

[VinDSL]

Can you hear me now?

Hola, from Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport.

Dern thing is still working!

 

[VinDSL]

Hey, I just noticed something...

If I plug the ReadyBoost drive into the left side USB ports, this lappy calls it E: drive.

If I plug the drive into the right side USB ports, it calls it F: drive.

Is that normal, or do I need a new lappy?

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: VinDSL

I noticed that my Toshiba Flash Cards (drop-down menu for the function keys) quit working a while back, after an update.

Didn't really bother me, since they're kind of a nuisance anyway... but curious minds need to know!

Ran all over the web - lots of ppl have the same problem - nobody had a cure.

Then, I started thinking, the Toshiba 'Value Added Package' adds all those buttons and menues to everything, so I reinstalled that - bingo!

I think the 'problem' was the installer. VAP is huge, like 38MB compressed - and the installer 'stalls' several times during the update, making you sorta think it's done - then a minute later, it does some more stuff, and so on, and so forth. Sooooo, I think I accidentally exited out of the upgrade, the first time I did it, before it was completed. The installer doesn't give you any indication what its doing in the background.

Jeepers! Toshiba must have read this thread!

I just download the latest version of VAP, and now it requires that you reboot the machine to install it... BEFORE Vista boots up!

Toshiba Flash Cards works MUCH better now!!!

 

[fire400]

is this like your personal toshiba-laptop blog? 'cuz you seem to be doing a good job at it..

 

[TheStu]

Originally posted by: fire400
is this like your personal toshiba-laptop blog? 'cuz you seem to be doing a good job at it..

TeeHee

 

[VinDSL]

Originally posted by: fire400
is this like your personal toshiba-laptop blog? 'cuz you seem to be doing a good job at it..

LoL!

Yeah, sorry!

Go start your own blog...