Because device manufacturers often don't read, or perhaps intentionally don't follow, specs, Microsoft has put a lot of little quirks into the driver to make it work.
Elantech touchpad software windows#
The underlying problem is HID over I2C, an input device protocol created by Microsoft and first used in Windows 8. Sometimes detaching the touchpad, as on an MS Surface or Acer Switch Alpha, can get it working again. Sometimes rebooting or switching the touchpad on and off can help. But on other computers, the setting may changed only from within Windows. On some computers, the setting may be in BIOS. Neither MS nor touchpad manufacturers actually follow the specs.Īs a result, many touchpads that require the new protocol don't work well with the Linux kernel module i2c-hid. Sometimes kernel updates can resolve the problem (or cause it to return). Is there is no ritual, no magic, that can make this touchpad cooperate with operating systems christened outside the MS Temple? What praises can I utter? What blessings can I seek? To make this touchpad work? This is a meta-question intended to get at the underlying problem with these touchpads, which is they are all on laptops that ran Windows 8/10. But I can't tear my laptop apart to replace it! It is just a horrible device designed to make my life miserable. They have nothing to do with whether the touchpad works. In short, all of these details are just random noise. Often it stops working when it "knows" I'm doing something important, exactly 666 ms before I am about to save my work. or that occur on a prime-numbered year, or when the sum of the digits of the version number is prime (1+8+0+4 = 13). Sometimes it becomes extra finicky when using even-numbered kernel updates, but super stable with odd-numbered updates.
Sometimes it stops working when I'm typing on page 37 of a particular document in Abiword, but page 23 when using LibreOffice. Sometimes it works or doesn't work when I reboot and the mouse cursor does or doesn't appear. Basically, these touchpads are super finicky and have given a lot of people problems under a variety of conditions. There are a lot of questions related to Elantech touchpads not working. The substance of this question is in the title and in bold. Some touchpads, designed for Win8/10, behave erratically with the Linux i2c-hid kernel module.