On my Lenovo Ideapad Z500 laptop, the touchpad works fine just after I power up the machine. A little later (usually 30 minutes to one hour) it starts malfunctioning. The pointer doesn't respond normally, touching the pad causes the pointer to move abruptly into different directions continually, even when the touch is fixed to a single point. Trying to move the pointer in a straight line results in the pointer taking a random "zigzag" path and not arriving anywhere near the intended destination.
Operating system: Windows 7 64-bit
Touchpad Manufacturer: ELAN
Driver Version: 11.4.8.1
Supporting Firmware: Elan Smart-Pad
Notes:
- I believe it's a hardware problem, because the touchpad is not malfunctioning always (as mentioned above). Also, because I tried uninstalling and re-installing the drivers and that didn't work either. More over, I tried Fedora 20 Live on the laptop and the touchpad problem still persists.
- When trying an external USB mouse, no problem is detected.