Precision M6500 touchpad jumps left a few inches when moving finger right

I am having the exact same issue on the exact same machine. I wonder if it has to do with Windows XP.

I have the same problems with my M6500's touchpad. Once in a while it becomes unresponsive and jumpy. But since I am running Win7 it's a more universal problem  and not confined to XP. Here is what I unsuccessfully already tried to fix it:

1) Installed latest drivers from Dell.

2) Deactivated the stick thingy.

3) Deactivated all but the most rudimentary options in the touchpad's control software.

But nothing helped.

-- Chris.

Computer: Precision M6500

Processor: Intel Core i7-720QM Quad Core 1.60GHz 6MB

Operating systems tested: Windows XP x64, Windows 7 64-bit

I have the same problem. The behavior is very erratic. The first thing I noticed was the problem of the cursor jumping left when I move my finger right. On several occasions, the touchpad stopped detecting movement altogether, and sometimes moved up/down when I moved left/right.

I've installed the latest drivers found on Dell's site for both Windows XP x64 and Windows 7 64-bit. Same problem. One tricky thing is that the problem is difficult to reproduce - It is intermittent and seems to happen randomly.

Dell is going to try to replace the entire panel which houses the touchpad, including the touchpad.

Will post an update once that happens.

Was this problem fixed for any of you?

Got the same problem on my new M6500. Touchpad gets drunk after a while. Thought it might be because of a wrong driver in the factory image. So I installed MS Windows 7 Enterprise from a Microsoft Partner DVD. Problem still exists.

Resetting the system removes the problem, but after a white it comes back again.

I had a M6400 before for two years. Never experienced this problem on that machine, and I use it very very much.....

Hope it gets fixed soon by Dell.

Precision M6500 I7 Win7 64bit

I am also having similar problems. My original touchpad would intermittently go dead on the entire left 25% of the pad - no response at all on this part of the pad. Resetting the machine would sometimes help and sometimes not help. Dell replaced the touchpad 3 days after I got the machine. The original problem is gone but the new touchpad still goes brain-dead after some use and requires a reset to correct. The symptoms I see now are that a dead area develops just left of center. The dead area is about 1/4" wide (right-to-left) and full height of the touchpad. Once this area goes dead it stays that way until a reset occurs. Sometimes a similar area also develops on the far left side. When these problems occur using the touchpad becomes an extremely frustrating experience, to say the least. I can only stand it for a short while before I have to shut everything down and reboot.

I love the M6500 but this problem is driving me nuts.

Same issue here. The chat support had me go to the Jog Shuttle Settings in the control applet and turn off the jog shuttle feature. It seems to work so far (15 min) but disables all the advanced features of the touchpad. Not a good answer if you ask me. Anyone else try this?

I called support today, because of this problem and a problem with the ATI 7740.

They are going to replace the touchpad tomorow. I will keep you informed if this will solve the problem.

I disabled Jog Shuttle and still get the problem.

Win7 64B, new motherboard bios firmware and all Windows Updates are installed.

It always boots up 100% correct and then slowly gets worse even if I am only running a web browser (and I have even tried different browsers).

Even just the motion rate seems to start slowing down.

Like everyone else says - the stick works fine as do USB mice...but this is a travel workstation and going without the pad is NOT AN OPTION.

Not very impressed for a brand new $5000 CAD workstation.

And I have logged a support claim with Dell and it has been a week now and they have yet to respond at all.

Ok disabling jog shuttle is definitely not the answer. The problem is back. As well as jumping to the left I also get random zooming while trying to move, anyone else get that?

" I also get random zooming while trying to move, anyone else get that?"

Yup.  

How about when sometimes you have to practically thump your finger down to register a mouse click and then other times you are just feather-touching the pad to do a move and it registers a click?  

Are there any Dell moderators watching this thread?

How about some input guys?

This is about my 12th high end laptop including 4 previous Dells, and this is the first time I have had any of these touchpad problems.

If I had turned up a thread like this 2 months ago when I was researching my purchase then I would be typing this on a HP.

I noticed the changing sensitivity too, thought it was just me, tried changing the setting but it didn't help. It seems like the problems always happen while touching the outer edge of the laptop but then I'm usually touching the outer edge. Replied to the support email twice today but have heard nothing back. Maybe the tag of this post will catch their eye.

And update on my case:

- Dell sent out a technician to replace the "palm rest" (the entire upper-facing panel housing the touchpad). The wrong part was sent and the technician ended up breaking the computer completely while disassembling it (before discovering that he had the wrong part).

- After two weeks, I received a replacement. The replacement has the same problem.

Today they replced the touchpad, the ATI graphics card and the memory in my 2 weeks old M6500. I will test the touchpad problem tonight at home, when i'm working without a mouse.

The strange thing is that the support people one the phone and the technical guy that replaced the touchpad was not aware of this threat and the problems people are having with the touchpad. Communication is still not top priority it seems. On the other hand I must say that one phonecall was enough to send a mechanic to replace the parts (i have a three years next business day contract).

Let's hope this solves my problems with the M6500, otherwise I'm going back to my M6400 on which I never had a problem in 2 years time.

Given that everyone seems to claim the same thing; "It works perfectly fine when you have newly booted up and then gets worse as you go." I would be very surprised if it is actually a hardware issue that can be solved by swapping parts.  Hardware is generally either working or broken.  This problem smells of bad drivers to me.  And it would appear from this thread that these machines are still being shipped this way today.   

It's not graphics card related because I don't have the ATi card.

It's not Jog Shuttle software related because a few of us have turned this off and had no change.

It's not correctable with new drivers or Windows Updates or bios updates because I have everything up to current. 

And it's not third party software related because the first time I got this problem was about 20 minutes after I unboxed it when I had only ever run MSIE and never even had a DVD in the brand new drive yet.

And it's not USB peripheral related because I don't run anything else plugged into the machine.

And it's not operating system related because I am on Win7 64 and the guy who started the thread is on XP.

I am running the fingerprint reader and this sucker was particularly buggy to get running correctly and it was the first thing I set up after power up.

Does anybody have the touchpad problem and NOT have the fingerprint reader?