Fix erratic touchpad on Dell E7240 laptop with Linux
I love my Dell E7240, it’s the perfect size for an always-with-you computer when you need a full keyboard to do real work.
However, I’ve been plagued with a bizarre problem when the cursor jumps wildly and erratically around the screen when you’re using the touchpad or are typing. I figured it was just my fingers grazing the touchpad as I typed, but then I stumbled across a post on Reddit which said that the BIOS was to blame. But back then there wasn’t a fix.
This morning I decided to see if there was a fix, and it turns out Dell released a BIOS fix just last week. I downloaded and installed it, and now my trusty companion is working 100%!
Since the BIOS update requires Windows or DOS to install, and I’m running Linux, I had to search around on how to do the BIOS update. Here’s what I did.
What you’ll need:
- Your Dell E7240 with the AC adapter – make sure it’s running on AC power
- A USB memory stick that you don’t mind formatting with at least 512MB total storage
Follow these instructions to update the BIOS:
- Download the BIOS update
- Go to the FreeDOS homepage and download the 256MB FreeDOS image
- Follow the instructions on that page to install the image to the USB stick
- Eject the USB stick, then re-insert it
- Copy the Dell BIOS EXE to the USB stick in the root folder
- Eject the USB stick, and use it to boot your laptop
- When asked, you want to start an fdos session, and then select Load FreeDOS without drivers
- Run the Dell BIOS EXE
- Your computer will run the update (see images below for what it will look like while updating)
- Once done, boot into the BIOS and make sure that the BIOS version is A14.
- Boot back into your Linux OS and now your touchpad shouldn’t be erratic!
