Aspire VN7-591G and Windows 7

diamondfish
diamondfish Member Posts: 13 New User
edited March 2023 in 2014 Archives

Hi,

 

I want to buy an Aspire VN7-591G and install Windows 7 on it. But from what I've read the touchpad is NOT USEABLE with Windows 7, is that correct?

 

Does Acer plan to fix this? I've read that all other drivers work, except the touchpad being unusable.

Answers

  • philetus
    philetus ACE Posts: 4,759 Pathfinder

    Looks like as of 10/06/14 there is not a solution. Acer doesn't make drivers. The hardware vendor supplies them. Synaptic has the ball on this one.

  • keith111
    keith111 Member Posts: 79 Troubleshooter

    Here is the Synaptics website:

    http://www.synaptics.com/en/drivers.php

  • diamondfish
    diamondfish Member Posts: 13 New User

    It would be nice to hear from anyone that has this computer and is running Windows 7 to hear that the drivers work and that the touchpad is fully functional on Windows 7. According to synaptics page there are driveres to be downloaded.

  • diamondfish
    diamondfish Member Posts: 13 New User

    I guess if anyone can comment on the 17" version, that'll do as well since they supposedly have the same hardware.

  • h4ppy
    h4ppy Member Posts: 4 New User

    got mine friday and first thing i did was installing win7. well, kind of. It installed fine, touchpad worked for me. i can't say anything about other drivers because when i wanted to set up the harddrive (i got the variant with the 256GB SSD and 1TB HDD) i noticed that windows setup put the "system reserved" partition on the HDD and not on the SSD what is an absolute no-go as i plan multiboot in this device. However MS suggests to disconnect all other disks during setup. This leads me to my problem: i can't diconnect the drive nor can i deactivate it in BIOS because there is no such switch.

     

    Would be nice of acer to quickly provide an BIOS update where we (at least) can disable the harddrive to install win7 cleanly.

  • diamondfish
    diamondfish Member Posts: 13 New User

    Thank you SO much for your answer! You don't know how much you help me out here! Smiley Happy

     

    But, if you have time to answer these questions, just to point things out very clearly, I would be happy Smiley Happy

     

    1. The computer you bought was the VN7-591G 15.6" version?

    2. Does the touchoad work without installing any other drivers?

    3. Does windows 7 support the synaptics drivers?

    4. Can you use features like multitouch and so on?

     

    Huge thanks.

     

  • h4ppy
    h4ppy Member Posts: 4 New User

    yes it's the 15.6" version and the touchpad worked out of the box.

     

    about questions 3 and 4 i can't say if multitouch or drivers work beacause i didn't test it. Still trying to trick windows 7 setup to place the partitions right. However i'll keep you updated.

  • diamondfish
    diamondfish Member Posts: 13 New User

    Okay! Thank you very much! Smiley Happy I'm definately going to buy one of these laptops now Smiley Happy

  • h4ppy
    h4ppy Member Posts: 4 New User

    finally managed to get those partitions right. if anyone wants to know here are the steps i went through:

     

    1. boot win7 install media

    2. delete all partitions from both SSD and HDD

    3. create a partition on the HDD with ~15GB

    4. install win7 to this partition

    5. insert any linux live media an boot

    6. use dd an copy the first ~15GB from HDD to SSD (dd if=/dev/sdb of=/dev/sda bs=100M count=15)

    7. reboot and make sure you boot from SSD and you can remove the original windows installation from HDD

     

    keep in mind that there might be some issues with TRIM since windows wasn't installed on the SSD. i don't know for sure so i'll have an eye on that.

     

    regarding your questions:

    short answer: everything is fine exept multitouch.

     

    long answer:

    mutitouch doesn't work out of the box so i tried installing the drivers from the download section. First thing when running the setup windows tells you that the drivers are not signed which is really bad because windows won't boot the usual way with unsigned drivers installed, however i went on. but at the end of the setup it tells you that no drivers were installed because the device does not exist. maybe Synaptic brings signed and installable drivers someday. all other drivers (wifi and bluetooth are from atheros, no idea why there are broadcom and intel drivers for download) install fine altough you can only select windows 8.1 at the download page

  • diamondfish
    diamondfish Member Posts: 13 New User

    How do you feel about the touchpad after some use? I've heard it's very sticky and inaccurate. What's your verdict?

  • philetus
    philetus ACE Posts: 4,759 Pathfinder

    I don't like them. I use a Kensington Trackball.

  • diamondfish
    diamondfish Member Posts: 13 New User

    Do you mean the touchpad on the Aspire VN7-591G or touchpads in general?

    I'm fine with touchpads for smaller use. But I would like to know if the Aspire VN7-591G touchpad is sticky and inaccurate like some people have said.

  • h4ppy
    h4ppy Member Posts: 4 New User

    well, i think it's average. i have used worse and better ones. sometimes double tapping the touchpad results in moving the curser instead of double clicking, thats annoing, but with some practice you should get used to that. usually thats a sign of oversensitivity.

  • 66Gunn58
    66Gunn58 Member Posts: 12 New User

    HI I have the v5-591g and have no problems with the touchpad. the multitouch controls took a few trys to get them as I like and now I'm happy with them  as for putting Win7 on I help a friend do this, the trick was to put the bios into legacy mode first. I've only done this once so I hope this helps.