Touchpad problem: cursor jumps (Maya 64bit, MATE)

[eolith]

Hello,

I have this annoying touchpad problem: I move the pointer with the touchpad. Then, at the end of the movement (i.e. when I release contact with the trackpad) the pointer makes a small jump on the screen of (seemingly) random magnitude and direction.

I have a dual boot HP Pavilion dv7 with Mint 13, MATE, 64bit, and a SynPS/2 Synaptics Touchpad. Booting with Windows 7 does not show this issue, indicating to me that the touchpad H/W is ok. Using a mouse with Mint also works completely fine.

I have searched in Linux forums, including this one, but I cannot find a solution. Any help would be welcome!

Best regards, Eolith

Edit 1: just tried Ubuntu live USB - precisely the same problem.

Edit 2: now tried Fedora - same problem. Seems like a Linux distro-only problem since Windows 7 is fine. Any suggestions? Thanks!!

Anybody out there with any suggestion? It is making the laptop very hard to use, since it won't let me click on the place I want; I have to aim 2 or 3 times before it lands on the right place. I don't want to go back to Windows! Thank you in advance for your help!

[laughfactory]

I have this same issue. It's extremely irritating and I'm not sure what to do about it. I'm running Mint 14.1 on an HP ENVY DV6T-7200. Everything else works great, but the pointer jumping juuuust as I go to click on something drives me batty. Can anyone offer us any assistance? Please?

[eolith]

I have now installed as a triple boot also Ubuntu 12.10, and made sure I have the latest updates. Precisely the same exasperating problem! For this reason, and because there is no response in this forum since initially posting this issue 19 dec, I have also asked the same question to the Ubuntu user community, check out http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2098397. No luck as yet though ... but I will update here when I get any progress.

[erie88]

I'm also having the same problem. The mouse jumpy as I click or right-clicking a a link, worse it'll clicking the opton right away.

Edited : Installing Gsynaptics packages seems to solves the problem. At least now I can handle the right-click.

[eolith]

Thanks for the suggestion and glad it works for you!

However installing Gsynaptics package does not resolve the issue for me. (I also understand that it is (near) obsolete for Mint and that rather gpointing-device-settings should be used...)

Anybody else have any assistance on offer? This problem drives me up the wall!

Thanks in advance.

[erie88]

Have you tried changing the touchpad setting after you have installed the GSynaptics packages? Look in Menu - Prefrences - Mouse and Touchpad - then go to the second tab "Touchpad". You'll need to reduce or adjust the accelaration and sensitivity or whatever there "that has a bar" to the left (Slow or Low).

[eolith]

Yes, have tried that, to no avail: in my case it is not a problem of speed, or sensitivity, or acceleration. Whenever I stop moving the pointer and release my finger, regardless aforementions settings, it jumps away in an unpredictable direction for an unpredictable distance.

But thanks again for your help, I do appreciate it.