[FIX] For T42 & T43 freezes and slowdowns

[dexta]

This is a fix for the random freezing some people seem to be getting on their T42's and T43's.

Refferences to some of the problems:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... ght=freeze
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... ght=freeze

I was recently trying to tweak my Windows XP install and in the process of doing so I was checking all of the applications that get executed at startup.

In order to see all the applications that get executed at startup do the following:
-click START
-go to RUN
-type in MSCONFIG
-press enter

The system configuration utility pops up. Now go to the startup tab and it lists all of the programs that get executed whenever you log on. Now as I was going down this list I was using this site to aid me in understanding the different application names:
http://www.answersthatwork.com/Tasklist ... sklist.htm
In particular when I reached the following application names:
-SynTPEnh
-SynTPLpr

I learnt the following:
Link: http://www.answersthatwork.com/Tasklist ... list_s.htm

Synaptics TouchPad Enhancements driver for laptops’ touchpads. The Synaptics drivers are used by a majority of laptop manufacturers. There are many problems associated with the Synaptics drivers : excessive amounts of CPU used by the drivers, inability to install specific software packages (mostly packages which use the Wise installer), and outright freezes of the laptop where often the only solution is to remove the battery as it is impossible to turn OFF the frozen laptop. Not all laptops exhibit these problems.

Now with the current laptops (eg. T42 +) you have an actual hardware timer that actually senses how long the power button has been pressed down for, hence you do not need to pull out the battery.

So I basically disabled those two applications and rebooted Windows XP. Now for the past 2 weeks I have never had any random freezes and whenever I log into the machine, windows starts up a hell of a lot faster then before. Before it used to take 30+ seconds to fully get ready, now it only takes at the most 10 seconds.

NOTE: by disabling those two applications the touchpad on your laptop stops working. However this should not be a problem for us IBM laptop users since we have the trackpoint. If you are used to using the touchpad I'd suggest rolling back to the initial version of the Synaptics touchpad program that your laptop came with.

Hope this helps a few folks.
G'night

[hoya]

That fixed my problems, too! Up to this point, my system has been extremely slow when I've attempted to open a document by double-clicking an icon (for instance, a Word document). I would get a 3-4 second delay, and then finally the document would open.

after disabling these two apps, the delay is gone!

in addition, I've noticed another added benefit after disabling those apps: the middle Ultranav button now opens windows in a new tab within firefox. very cool! and that same button will close the tabs as well (as opposed to right-clicking and choosing close).

thanks for sharing that information - huge improvement on my system.

[astros55]

I was the original poster of the second thread referred to dexta's post, and I was pumped that this was the answer to my problems. Unfortunately, the joy only lasted two days. I disabled the synaptic drivers on Wed. and I just had a freeze-up today (Fri.). I don't know if makes any difference, but I still retained use of my touchpad (even though I don't actually use it). I read somewhere that the Windows touchpad drivers take over. But I also did experience the UltraNav changes noted by hoya above.

Not sure what to do now. I think I'll update by BIOS (which was the thing that started this [censored] mess) this time to 3.17, and if that doesn't help, uninstall SP2, and roll back my BIOS to the factory original of 3.06f and the Embedded Controller to 3.02.

If anyone has any suggestions/tips on how to go about these changes/rollbacks, I'd appreciate it.

[Kenn]

The middle ultranav button is doing that because without the driver, it defaults to "third mouse button."

The thing is, you can get this functionality while using the Synaptics driver as well. The reason nobody knows is because they use the unfortunate terminology "Neither" to describe it, so when you're examining the options for the 3rd mouse button you see Scroll, Magnify, Neither. Brilliant.