Solved! TouchPad issue - Acer Aspire 4738Z

[gus_274]

Hi Everyone,

My sister bought as brand new Acer Aspire 47387Z laptop about 2 years ago and gave it to someone to configure. When she got it back the touchpad was not working and she put the laptop aside.

Now that she wants to use it (I know 2 years later!), she asked me if I can fix it and I'm totally stumped on what else I can do. The touchpad will not work at all including the right/left buttons. As a workaround, I have a USB mouse that is connected. Strangely, the touchpad does not appear anywhere in the device manager. When I click on "mouse" in the control panel I get a popup that says "Unable to connect to the Synaptics Pointing Device Driver".

It's running with Windows 7 SP1. Here is what I have tried so far:

- Confirmed that the touchpad is not locked by pressing the Fn+F7 keys and it does show when it's locked and unlocked on the screen.
- Removed battery and power cable and held down the power button for a minute
- Reinstalled OS back to factory default
- Installed all OS updates
- Updated all drivers including flashing the BIOS
- Reset BIOS to default settings (I notice that this laptop does not have many parameters as what I'm used to seeing with other computers)

I have researched all I could and cannot determine what else I can try. Your help is greatly appreciated.

 

[hang-the-9]

Did you check the touchpad connections to the motherboard?

 

[gus_274]

I was hoping to avoid opening up laptop to check, but I went ahead and removed the keyboard. I have confirmed that the touchpad is securely connected to the motherboard.

 

[hang-the-9]

Boot off a Linux Live disk, does it work OK using that? Is the BIOS one where you can use the mouse? It should be if the system is only a few years old. Does the mouse work in the BIOS? If not, there is some physical damage to the touchpad hardware.

 

[gus_274]

That was a great idea to try booting off a Linux live disk. So even in Linux, the touchpad is not working. This pretty much confirms that it's a hardware issue. The mouse does not work in the bios. Not sure if it's possible to swap out the touchpad as I think they are built into the case.

 

[Prostar Computer]

That was a great idea to try booting off a Linux live disk. So even in Linux, the touchpad is not working. This pretty much confirms that it's a hardware issue. The mouse does not work in the bios. Not sure if it's possible to swap out the touchpad as I think they are built into the case.

It's doable, but kind of a pain. The circuit board for the touchpad is glued to the top portion of the chassis. You typically have to use a heat gun (to loosen the adhesive) and prying tools. Worst case scenario? It's the main board that's the problem.