Fingerprint reader unresponsive on 7490

I've had similar experiences with their Self Encrypting Drives (SED). We used to order Latitudes with both finger print sensors and SEDs, with the thought that we'd be really secure if one of our laptops got stolen.

It was an unmitigated disaster. Check my post history for my comments about using the Dell suite of "security and protection" products which included the fingerprint software and SED software. Literally 60+ hours of screwing around trying to get the products actually working on Windows 7.

Now that we've upgraded to Windows 10 we no longer order SEDs and instead just use Bitlocker. All of our Windows 7 machines have SEDs which are not being used because the software just plain doesn't work, was impossible to install, or routinely bricks / kills the hard drives for no reason other than it thinks it's been compromised and won't unlock.

Maybe it all works well if you have 10,000 people in your company and your IT dept has some massive complex $150,000 managed "Dell Security Encryption Protection Suite Enterprise Virtual Cloud Service for Windows 2016 Datacenter Edition" (or god knows what they actually call it).

But for everyone else, my company included, it's just an aggravating pile of junk that I've struggled with and never got working, so we just don't use it anymore.

I have talked to official support.
About three weeks ago they replaced my fingerprint reader to new one - but of course without any change.
Today I have received infromation that my Latitude 7390 doen't support Windows Hello feature. So there is no official possibilty that reader works stable.
(Why did they replace reader...?)

I am little confused what to do with new laptop...

we have 6 brand new dell laptops, latitude. Those fingerprint sensors are useless - same symptoms as described above. 

I volunteered for support - they want to replace the fingerprint

Of course, I do not agree because it is not a problem and nothing can be replaced

Personally I think the physical hardware is fine. It's whatever happens after you rub your finger on the sensor that doesn't work properly. It's a driver or a low level function or some problem with ControlPoint and how it accesses the Trusted Platform Module that ends up being the problem.

I have had TONS of problems with Dells security suite of software. I've bricked SSDs by no fault of my own trying to use the Dell Data Protect Encryption software with pre-boot authentication. I've spent countless hours trying to get the Dell Data Protection suite working without much luck. Knowing that the fingerprint reader also talks to that software makes me think it's not the physical hardware, it's the software layer underneath that doesn't work well.

I've plugged in external fingerprint scanners via USB, and using their 3rd party software that came with the scanner, it was far more reliable. You have to do that in case you want to use a fingerprint scan to wake up a laptop that is docked to 2 monitors and has it's lid closed.

The fingerprint readers on Dell business laptops don't work well as we've all experienced. The SSD /  self encrypting drives with pre-boot authentication don't work well as I can attest to after years of screwing around with them. I haven't used smart card authentication with Dell business laptops but if I did, I can bet it wouldn't work well either.

There's no instructions or steps anywhere that tell you how to use Dell Data Protection suite of security programs so you just have to screw around with it trying to get it to work. We've reached out to our reseller/integrations vendor (one of the largest in the country) and even THEY told us it's a poor product and not to use it.

I've given up on it all and use Windows 10 with Bitlocker for drive encryption and we no longer use the fingerprint readers.

The same issue on 5490. They switch a new sensor three times with no result.

Yes, it looks like. Does we have some response from Dell? Would them fix it? Sorry for english.

Not bad. But when you wake up from hibernation nothing will save you. The reader does not answer at all.

I had the same problem with a new E5491 and was about to return it. After experimenting I found that pressure is your friend. If you just touch the reader it is unreliable. But if you press your finger down I find it reads it 80% of the time. YMMV.

I have a 7490, and had the same issue with the weak fingerprint reader.

Now I have tried out with my thumb finger, and 9 out of 10 times it works like a charm.

The fingerprint sensor's algorithm should recognize your finger independent of rotation or shifting. In reality the algorithm (working with sensor's input data) is really sensitive even to small shifts. Maybe the sensor is not efficient enough, but it gets along better with the wider, more contoured lines of my thumb.

I don't know why are they using such a garbage sensor in a business class notebook, these are the small details which could easily mess up the good user experience.