Getting rid of "ghost touches" on Dell laptop

October 18, 2016 7:16 AM

Hi. The cursor flies around opening/closing programs, etc. I see these weird "bubbles" at top of screen all along at points where icons are. Like someone's touching tablet. Well-known phenomenon -- and NOT a virus.

Months ago i stumbled on a fix after talking it through here:
google result
Disabling to say the least...
Restart helps but only for so long. I can't recall which method I applied to fix it, but it went away one day. Now it's back after what? I dunno. I don't use this as a flex lappy. There was a big Windows 10 update the other day...

posted by noelpratt2nd to Computers & Internet (10 answers total)

Response by poster: I meant I talked it through a bit in Metafilter, sorry. The google link above is just a typical starting point: some of those videos, etc., don't work for me. Or maybe a bunch of things consequentially end up fixing it before. Dell Inspiron 11 (3000 series) 3147.
posted by noelpratt2nd at 7:30 AM on October 18, 2016

Have you reinstalled a completely clean operating system in order to remove all traces of what the scam "tech support" company put on your machine, as advised in the answers to your previous question about this issue?
posted by bcwinters at 7:41 AM on October 18, 2016

Response by poster: Oh yes, done.
Hard to even restart cuz cursor won't sit still.
At this moment things are fine, waiting for the craziness again...then have to actually shut down, boot back up.
posted by noelpratt2nd at 8:03 AM on October 18, 2016

Get lens wipes and wipe the screen of any stains and remove any possible moisture. That's what usually activates the touch screen
posted by I-baLL at 9:16 AM on October 18, 2016

I don't have a solution, but if you can't use the cursor and need to reboot you can do the following:
Hit: Windows Key + R (opens the run dialog)
Type: shutdown /r /t 0 (/r = reboot, /t 0 = wait zero time until reboot)
Hit: Enter (runs the command)
posted by gregr at 9:22 AM on October 18, 2016 [2 favorites]

Best answer: I disabled the driver for the touch screen on a machine that did this to me. You lose the touch screen entirely, of course, but the mouse/touchpad worked fine after that.
posted by Eddie Mars at 11:25 AM on October 18, 2016

Response by poster: I go to Human Interface Devices or something under Dev Mgr, but there's nothing on right-click about disabling touch.
So far today -- amazing, it's gone away. Maybe just posssssibly it was some humidity Inspiron is overly sensitive to when I came down to visit a friend in the country by the river. But today is dry...
posted by noelpratt2nd at 11:53 AM on October 18, 2016

Response by poster: Awww...it came back! Gotta find a fix.
That reset/reinstall didn't do the trick months ago.
posted by noelpratt2nd at 4:57 AM on October 19, 2016

Response by poster: One attempted fix that might have been the one that ultimately work months ago (after the reinstall) had something to do w/ a place you go and you change a number...as in from 3 to 4. Can't recall where that is.
posted by noelpratt2nd at 6:38 AM on October 19, 2016

Response by poster: I think I fixed it! I had uninstalled the touchscreen driver, then of course it reinstalls w/ the restart -- but what I really needed to do was disable it (because evidently it reinstalls as enabled). Heck, I don't even use the touchscreen. Thanks, Eddie Mars. And everyone.
posted by noelpratt2nd at 1:08 PM on October 19, 2016