Touchpad issue, HP dv7 notebook

[scytale47]

Hi folks,

I currently use an HP dv7t-1000 as my "spare tire" computer.  I've since upgraded to a better, newer laptop, but I use this machine as an extra 'bonus' laptop that I can loan to friends and not worry about.

Recently, though, I've encountered an issue that may well be the death knell of this laptop.  Quite frequently, the touchpad stops working.  Here's what I've tried.  None of these solutions have fixed the problem:

1.  Pressing the button between the keyboard and the touchpad which toggles the touchpad.  When the touchpad is malfunctioning, this tends to have no effect whatsoever.  The light that's next to this toggle button is theoretically orange when the t-pad is disabled, and white when it's illuminated.  In fact, the color of this light seems to have no bearing on whether or not the t-pad will work.

2.  Restart.  Yes, I've tried this many times.  Moreover, sometimes the t-pad will be disabled on boot, and none of the remedies I've discovered have any effect until I restart again.

3.  Hard reset.  The old 'unplugging the ac adapter, taking out the battery, and holding down the power button' trick.  Doesn't do squat.

4.  Driver troubleshooting.  I've installed new drivers, I've rolled back to old ones.  No effect.

Here's what has worked, though they're not ideal fixes:

1.  Fiddling with the display.  <tangent>:  These 17-inch laptops were poorly made, in fact, this current machine is the spawn of a product replacement by HP.  The original had its backlight malfunction four times in a month, so they collected the old laptop and replaced it with this one.  Current model has had all sorts of issues, from a display that clicks when opened to a penchant for borking ac adapters.  Long story short, terrible experience with HP in general. </tangent>.  Anyway, moving the display back and forth often seems to make the touchpad work, albeit temporarily.  Hardly a solid fix.

2.  USB mouse.  The problem can be completely circumvented by using a USB mouse, in which case it never crops up.  I don't like having to carry one around, though, and I'm usually not working in a situation where a mouse gets good 'traction.'

I should add that sometimes the keyboard stops working too, but I feel like that's more related to insufficient memory/resource mgmt than a hardware issure.

I'd like to be able to rely on this computer more, and I hate to junk it, given that it's somewhat functional.  Any tips/suggestions/things to try would be deeply appreciated.  I think that perhaps the ribbon connecting the touchpad to the motherboard is loose, but I'd like to get some confirmation on that hypothesis before I pull open the case.

Thanks in advance for any responses!