New Macbook Pro locking up and has serious trackpad issues under Boot Camp

Question

Level 1

5 points

New Macbook Pro locking up and has serious trackpad issues under Boot Camp

My new MacBook Pro is locking up occasionally under Windows Vista on Boot Camp and it seems to be related to the track pad or mouse pointer movement in general.

Everything will be going along fine and then during trackpad movement (the trackpad software is serious screwed up in Boot Camp, BTW!) it will just freeze solid. No error messages, no keyboard response, nothing - just a solid freeze.

I have the previous MacBook Pro as well (the one with 8600M GT) and it is 100% rock-solid - it never crashed like this. Vista was 100% reliable on that machine. It appears to run just as well on this new Macbook (9600GT, 2.8Ghz processor, 4Gb RAM, 320Gb 7200 rpm hard drive) but then just freezes out of the blue. It doesn't happen very often - perhaps once or twice a day.

The reason I think it is related to mouse & trackpad drivers is because it never just hangs up by itself, it only hangs when I'm moving the mouse pointer.

In addition the trackpad doesn't work properly under Boot Camp (Windows Vista) at all. It "loses" the click when trying to select, or drag-and-drop items and works very poorly. I'm guessing this is a driver issue on the Boot Camp side because the pad works as expected under OS X and even works properly when using Vista Windows under VMWare Fusion. The trackpad on my previous MacBook Pro worked flawlessly with Vista whereas this one is basically unusable for now.

When can we expect a new trackpad driver for Boot Camp that works as expected?

Macbook Pro (fall 2008), Mac OS X (10.5.5), Macbook Pro (fall 2008) Mac OS X (10.5.5) 2.8Ghz core 2 duo, 9600GT, 4Gb Ram

Posted on Oct 27, 2008 9:44 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Kappy

Level 10

361,741 points

Oct 27, 2008 10:09 AM in response to Mark-NC

You can return it within the first 14 days since purchase for either a replacement or your purchase price less restocking fee.

You can complain about the problems, but we can't fix any of them because they are hardware related. Since the Discussions are only a user-to-user system, Apple does not monitor them and will not see anything you post here. If you want to provide feedback, bug report, feature request, then go here: Feedback.

Reply

Answer 2

Type_11

Level 1

5 points

Oct 31, 2008 10:45 PM in response to Mark-NC

i have the same thing. Brutal here is hoping they get new drivers soon (almost 100% it is not hardware). Mine also randomly goes to sleep in Vista 64 for no reason. think the drivers are half baked.

Reply

Answer 3

Mark-NC1

Level 1

0 points

Nov 1, 2008 7:06 PM in response to Type_11

I should add that this problem ONLY happens under Windows through Boot Camp. Windows through Fusion works like a charm and I have been rock-solid under OS X. My usage pattern is: use the machine all day long at work - sleep it for the ride home - turn it back on when I get home - sleep it in the morning for the ride to work then repeat. Same pattern as my previous (and equally rock solid) MacBook Pro. No problems when I avoid Boot Camp which leads me to be even more sure this is a driver problem under Boot Camp - especially considering the buggy nature of the trackpad under Boot Camp. The Trackpad performs exactly as expected when running Windows under VMWare Fusion but obviously not as quickly 🙂

Reply

Answer 4

capaho

Level 4

3,673 points

Nov 1, 2008 7:19 PM in response to Mark-NC

Did you install the Boot Camp drivers in Windows from the OS X installation disc after you installed Windows?

Reply

Answer 5

Mark-NC1

Level 1

0 points

Nov 2, 2008 3:59 AM in response to capaho

Of course I did. Just like I did on my previous MacBook Pro which has worked perfectly under Vista for a long, long time.

Reply

Answer 6

capaho

Level 4

3,673 points

Nov 2, 2008 4:42 AM in response to Mark-NC1

Well then, sounds like the Boot Camp trackpad driver for Vista needs an update.

Reply

Answer 7

Nov 8, 2008 2:18 PM in response to capaho

Same Trackpad driver problem on Windows XP Pro via WMWare Fusion, freeze on click.
Impossible to work.

Reply

Answer 8

Nov 8, 2008 5:44 PM in response to Mark-NC

there is definately a problem with bootcamp and vista on these new machines. It's totally unstable.

Reply

Answer 9

sum1else

Level 1

0 points

Nov 12, 2008 8:19 AM in response to Mark-NC

Same situation here.
Previous MBP 15" never froze in Vista.
Since purchasing the new 15" mbp, Vista occasionally locks up completely. No control alt delete, only way to fix it is to cut the power. I also have the trackpad problems. In addition sometimes the trackpad stops responding to anything completely. It also goes crazy sometimes, when I am browsing on IE the page will jump up and down erratically because it thinks I am dragging up and down

Reply

Answer 10

1200gsa

Level 1

0 points

Nov 12, 2008 8:54 AM in response to Mark-NC

A number of people (me included) have solved this problem by updating to later versions of the nvidia GPU drivers at www.laptopvideo2go.com. I am now running 179.14 and have had no issues since (several days now). I had to copy the INF file and overwrite the one that's included in the download (otherwise the setup failed when I tried to run it)

Hope it helps
Justin

Reply

Answer 11

sfingold

Level 1

0 points

Nov 12, 2008 10:24 AM in response to Mark-NC

Can you give us detailed instructions how you installed the new driver?

Reply

Answer 12

xesique

Level 1

0 points

Nov 19, 2008 3:59 AM in response to Mark-NC

I have the same situation.
Besides, I updated the Trackpad firmware that just released, and same thing still happened.

I doubt that is because of the AirPort driver, since it is not going well with the sound driver either.

Reply