Synaptics driver enables multitouch gestures on older trackpads

Haven't updated your laptop's trackpad driver lately? Then you may well want to consider doing so, at least if your laptop is equipped with a Synaptics trackpad. As a user on the Hardware Zone forums discovered, the latest Synaptics driver seems to enable multitouch gestures on older laptops that didn't previously support them, including two-finger scrolling, and three-finger click. What's more, while the drivers themselves come from HP, they should work just fine on other laptops with a Synaptics trackpad. Hit up the link below to try it out for yourself.

[brownma1 Posted Mar 19th 2010 7:01PM]

Running it on my Dell E1505 with XP. It's a little limited right now but it is super nice to have two finger scroll

[EEguy Posted Mar 19th 2010 7:19PM]

Working very well on my Haier W59 ! (3+yr old, generic ECS/uniwill re-badge I think)

If this works on mine, it really should work on any Synaptics equipped laptop.

[justbeez Posted Mar 19th 2010 7:52PM]

Man, can't wait until My Precision M6400 gets some driver love for this. Jog-shuttle AND Multitouch; can't go wrong there.

[justbeez Posted Mar 19th 2010 8:07PM]

@justbeez Ok, so I got it to install . . . but now my jog-shuttle won't work. Sigh.

[TBolt Posted Mar 19th 2010 8:51PM]

installed it -- the pinch-zoom didn't zoom all too well; kind of choppy and touches didn't register most of the time. i guess i could keep adjusting the myriad settings, but screw it...it's the weekend. :)

[FlareSama Posted Mar 19th 2010 10:48PM]

Installed on my HP G60-237us I bought last year. It did not have multitouch functionality from go. Works like a charm. It almost feels Mac-like.

[roflcopter Posted Mar 19th 2010 11:14PM]

Ok guys, just to report. It worked in my computer. Still have to get used to it (sometimes it clicks instead of scrolling, perhaps I need to press harder). It's FUCKING AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

[pavelgr Posted Mar 20th 2010 1:05AM]

It works on my HP 4510s! Thank you! It is.. refreshing!

[leewhat2004 Posted Mar 20th 2010 1:26AM]

I went back to the older modded driver, this driver loses the two and three finger gestures, which I used frequently...

[raunaq360 Posted Mar 20th 2010 3:58AM]

Worked great on my 3 year old XPS M1330.

[killstr3ak Posted Mar 20th 2010 5:20AM]

Hmm... I don't think it's working for me.

Anyone out there have any suggestions? I have a 1 year old HP DV4-1313dx laptop with a synaptics trackpad, I did the update and rebooted, but I'm not seeing where I can adjust these settings or whatever.

I really just want the two finger scrolling for going up and down on webpages. I loooooooooove that feature on my girlfriends macbook and would be thrilled if I can get it working on my HP.

Please help if you can!

Thanks in advance,

Jordan
[e-mail]

[sboardr22 Posted Mar 20th 2010 8:25PM]

@killstr3ak
did you uninstall the previous version?
Then you have to double click on the Synaptics Pointing Device icon in the taskbar, go to Device Settings, then click Settings for your trackpad, and then you should see the same window as in the link on that page this article is linked to.
Hope that helped.

[iHack13 Posted Mar 20th 2010 8:42AM]

wow how ridiculous, I am using a 4 year old laptop and had 2finger scrolling support from the start thanks to osx86 project (yeah hackintosh)

good to hear that the "native" OS for this PC supports such a decisive feature now, which has been supported in another OS for ages although its not designed to run on pcs ..

[AnastasiosAntonios Toulkeridis Posted Mar 20th 2010 9:19AM]

hi from Greece.
I've finally found it:
for windows 7 users right click the synaptics notification icon and select properties.
next click the device settings tab and on that tab click the settings button

[sboardr22 Posted Mar 20th 2010 8:21PM]

ahhhhhhhhh!!! Thank you so much for posting this find Engadget! I'm loving every bit of the two-finger scrolling on my lenovo t-400. Before this I kind of loathed my trackpad. I can finally scroll in iTunes again also with my touchpad!!! So stoked right now!

[maattp Posted Mar 20th 2010 9:00PM]

Dam it I have Alps. It sucks. I use a mouse all the time

[rodrigo9210 Posted Mar 21st 2010 11:43AM]

I need some help. My latop cant support chiral scroll, three finger press and pinch to zoom, those options dont even appear in the setting menu, could this be because my pc is from 2008. Also it says that the version is 6.3 and not 6.5 like in the image of the post. I would like to know why it can support two fingers scroll and three finger flick.but it cant support the other options.

[LEDfoot Posted Mar 22nd 2010 12:38PM]

The linux synaptics driver has been doing this for years...

[sullivan504 Posted Mar 31st 2010 9:41PM]

Doesn't work well (some features work, others do not) on the HP EliteBook 2730p... bummer.