My laptop will not respond properly to the touchpad unless I have the external mouse attached. If I boot linux (and X, which is all I use) with the mouse, both the mouse and touchpad work fine (if I then disconnect the mouse, the touchpad still works). However, if I boot without the mouse, the pointer jumps at random and the system is useless. I've lived with this for a while (I like the mouse) but it's getting awkard on the road...please help!

Thanks.

Some details:
Dell Latitude C610, BIOSversion A05
Red Hat 9 running Gnome 2.0
External mouse is PS/2, 2 buttons with wheel (marked "Dell by Microsoft")

Setting in Dell Setup screen for pointing device: either "PS/2 mouse" or "Touchpad-PS/2 mouse" (both give same result). I didn't try the only other choice ("Serial Mouse") since it seemed irrelevant...

gpm is not running (in RunLevel 5)

Relevant sections of XF86config (I know enough to look there but not enough to know what to do!):
-----------------------------------------------------------------
# XFree86 4 configuration created by pyxf86config

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Default Layout"
Screen 0 "Screen0" 0 0
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
InputDevice "DevInputMice" "AlwaysCore"
EndSection
...
Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "IMPS/2"
Option "Device" "/dev/psaux"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"

# If the normal CorePointer mouse is not a USB mouse then
# this input device can be used in AlwaysCore mode to let you
# also use USB mice at the same time.
Identifier "DevInputMice"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "IMPS/2"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
EndSection
-----------------------------------------------------------------

(this is what gets generated when I select "Wheel Mouse (PS/2)" from the Mouse Configuration menu in Gnome).

Actually this may have nothing to do with LINUX, I have this exact Dell lappy, C610 and I took it off my bosses hands cause he couldn't stand the mouse (so I fixed it... yay). Its running Windows XP (ran 2000 pro as well), and had the SAME problem, the mouse would act up just as you describe it. The touchpad alone would cause the mouse to jitter up and down.. and move etc.

Unfortunetly I solved this by disabling the touch-pad in BIOS (you have an option to do so). I only use an external mouse with it now. And have had no issues. I know this doesn't solve your problem, BUT I think it may be a dell issue and not a config one in linux. I have one of those TINY mice that i use with the laptop now, and have had no mouse issues.

Sorry no solution but just a confirmation that I have the same problem.

I don't know about "AlwaysCore", but I have mouse set to "SendCoreEvents".

I read that w/touchpad, you cannot have a PS/2 mouse attached, it will crash X.

I have USB mouse, Synaptics TouchPad is core pointer, always works fine. USB mouse only works if I boot up without it attached. X won't start with it attached. I just plug it in after X starts, and it works fine.

The problem seems to be with X, not the computer: when running Windows2000 on the same machine it works fine with or without the mouse.

The mouse is a PS/2 mouse and it works fine when attached (and the touchpad works then, too). The problem is when booted without the mouse attached, the touchpad won't work (under X). Oddly, if X is started with the mouse attached, then I can unplug the mouse and go on using the touchpad. So I have to carry the mouse with me just to get X started...

I have a similar problem. The touchpad causes the mouse to be unnavigateable. I just turned the touchpad off in the Bios for now (set to serial mouse) and use an external USB mouse.

If I use a 2.4 Kernel distro such as Knoppix and boot it from CD, both touchpad and USB mouse work!

However, I've extensively (since a couple of days) searched the net and found http://www.ee.oulu.fi/~tuukkat/tmp/l...20040625.patch which apparently solves the problem by letting the 2.6 kernel behave like the 2.4 Kernel with respect to input devices, such as the touchpad. I haven't been able to compile the 2.6.6 kernel with the appropriate patch on my Ubuntu 5.10 Laptop. If someone here knows how to upgrade the patch, so that it can be applied to the 2.6.12 Kernel which ships with Ubuntu 5.10, that would greatly be appreciated.

Otherwise, does anyone know if the new kernel versions would fix this error?

Im having same problem. Maybe the 2.6 kernel isnt compatible with this dell c610's touchpad? 2.4 just works. The sound works as well. Perhaps 2.4 is best bet for this laptop model.

What happens when you install without the mouse? Does the touch pad work?

I've got an Inspiron 600m and installed with only the touch pad. I occasionally add a mouse, but only rarely and only after KDE has started.

In Slack I ran into some walls trying to get touchpad to work with usb. When I reconfigured my xorg.conf with ps2 support instead of usb I can use mouse or no mouse (touchpad) and everything was perfect.

You might want to update your BIOS. A quick look at Dell's website shows the current BIOS version for your system is A16.

I would also suggest that you use the IMPS/2 mouse type and set the BIOS option to disable the touchpad when the PS/2 mouse is installed.

I think 2.6 shoudl work fine with that lattitude. I have Inspiron 8100 adn it works pretty well. This must be a config issue when moving from 2.4 to 2.6.

dtor
You're absolutely correct. It does work. Only, not fine. Like I said 2.6 broke a lot of stuff and this by the way, was a fresh install of 2.6. Maybe instead of using huge26.s I should have went for a manual config instead?

Nethgh0st,

Frankly I have no idea what huge26.s is but if your distribution is indeed Slackware 10.2 it is kind of dated...

What version of 2.6 does it have? The touchpad in c610 I believe is ALPS. Does the kernel recognize it as such? Do yo have Synaptics X driver installed? evdev module loaded? What is your X config (is it xorg or xfree?).

I never got this to work with Red Hat 9, but recently upgraded to Fedora Core 6 on the same machine and now it works like a charm. I have no idea what changed--either something in the kernel (now 2.6.20) or an improved version of X? Anyway, it works for me now.

I concur. have that same laptop with the A16 BIOS and have never had a touchpad or mouse issue with gentoo, fedora, ubuntu, or knoppix.