Trackpad film

[clockcycles]

Ok, I just got my new ANSI Pinebook Pro today, I have one stupid question..

The trackpad is described at matte everywhere I looked, on mine it's shiny and maybe has a film attached. Is there a film I should remove? I don't want to damage it by trying when I shouldn't...

Thanks!

Simon

[carlosqueso]

Ok, I just got my new ANSI Pinebook Pro today, I have one stupid question..

The trackpad is described at matte everywhere I looked, on mine it's shiny and maybe has a film attached. Is there a film I should remove? I don't want to damage it by trying when I shouldn't...

Thanks!

Simon

Yup, there's a film.  You should be able to carefully pull it off.

[calinb]

Thanks for the tip! I was able to get a thin knife blade under a corner of the film and pull it off. The feel and action of the pad is more consistent now but, despite trying a number of settings using the synclient CLI, minute adjustments of the cursor are still challenging at times. The motion at very low speed is not as consistent as I'd like; it's slow enough but has a slight lag or hysteresis in motion changes or something.

[KC9UDX]

Unfortunately, until we get a new firmware for the touchpad, this is just the way it is. For now, there are adjustments you can make to your input device settings to make it better, but you can't make it perfect.

The firmware is being worked on (I'm not sure how actively), and you could work on it if you like. I'd like to, but it's an Intel microcontroller (IIRC) and I'm using what little resources I have dealing with MC6800 at the moment.

Note that I'm referring to actual firmware that runs on the microcontroller, not what Linux calls "firmware" which is really driver software.

[calinb]

Unfortunately, until we get a new firmware for the touchpad, this is just the way it is.  For now, there are adjustments you can make to your input device settings to make it better, but you can't make it perfect.
<snip>

Yes. I've played with many settings using synclient and I believe the reason it can't be made perfect is hysterises. It's easy to get a feel for how hysterises is the primary factor by initially setting it very high--say 100.

synclient HorizHysteresis=100
synclient VertHysteresis=100

These settings create a huge unresponsive dead zone on the touchpad, of course. Then gradually reduce it back to 0 (or null appears to have the same effect of minimum hysteresis). Unfortunately even null or zero values still result in a couple of millimeters or so of dead zone, which precludes fine adjustments of the cursor without some degree of frustration--at least some of the time (when you don't get lucky with finger inputs).

synclient HorizHysteresis=0
synclient VertHysteresis=0

In comparing my PBP to my HP Laptop running MX-Linux, the minimum hysterises is the big difference. (My HP has no detectable hysterises so it's sensitive to very slight rolling motions of the finger tip to "fine-tune" position.)

Is the hysteresis in the hardware or the firmware or the Linux driver? I suspect hardware and/or the firmware.

[KC9UDX]

It's the firmware for sure; not Linux at all, and the hardware itself isn't really capable of it as far as I know.