Dave-H

Oops, OK well at least we know it will work like that in 8.1! I'll try again in XP now and let you know if it's the same.

OK, I've done that, and the driver is still working OK, and the settings are holding across reboots. I'm getting the complaint from the hotkey program ElanTPCfg.exe again as before, but that obviously doesn't matter. I didn't replace the avi files as they have different names. What I have now in the Etantech folder is - ETDAniConf.exe 11.0.0.7 ETDCtrl.exe 11.0.0.13 ETDCtrlHelper.exe 11.0.0.7 ETDDeviceInformation.exe 11.19.0.1 ETDService.exe 11.0.0.4 ETDUn_inst.exe 10.0.0.9 Setup.exe 11.0.0.4 ETD_DLL.dll 11.0.0.4 ETDApi.dll 10.0.0.9 ETDApix.dll 11.0.0.8 ETDCmds.dll 11.0.0.8 ETDFavorite.dll 11.0.0.7 ETDMcpl.dll 11.0.0.10 ETDUninst.dll 10.0.0.1 ETD.sys 11.0.0.31

OK, so I have a complete copy of all the files from 11.5.20.3 in the Frankendriver\x86 folder. I added to it the setup.exe file (11.0.0.4) from the 11.4.14.1 x86 folder, renamed to setip.exe. When I ran setip.exe, the driver install worked. That sounds good!

OK, I've tried all those options, and the setup fails to run in any of the setups I'm afraid. Monitoring the Windows Task Manager, it does look as if the "top level" setup.exe simply runs the one in the x86 folder, presumably after determining that it's a 32 bit system.

I have assumed that it's the setup.exe from 11.4.14.1 (tp118w7.exe) that needs to be copied to the "Frankendriver" folder. I don't think that the spreadsheet says which one to copy. Using that one (11.0.0.4) it appears to do nothing, it runs and then immediately closes. Should it be the one from the top level of the extracted tp118w7.exe?

I suspect we got confused as to what "auto-started" actually meant in this case! Anyway, not worth arguing about (says the guy who started the argument!) I will try out the latest "Frankendriver" and report back, but it won't be for a few hours I'm afraid. Cheers, Dave.

That's what I said wasn't it?

The other way around, ETDCtrlHelper does not auto-run from the driver, but Jaclaz's modified versions will run manually without throwing errors, or of course they can be run at boot from the registry "run" key where ETDCtrl.exe is started from. They don't start with the driver though.

Yes, I was surprised to find no Elantech entry under HKLM\Software on either operating system! I'm sure there was one with some of the other drivers. I think the things it contained (such as the install source path) are now in fact at the top of the HKCU key.

OK, was just going to report that I couldn't immediately see any fundamental difference between the registry entries on 8.1 and XP. They are attached if you want to have a look. Certainly just replacing the XP ones with the 8.1 ones does not make the settings saving issue come good! I will try later on what you now say to do. HKCUElantech81.reg HKCUElantechXP.reg

OK, I tried both modified versions, and they both now run without any error messages. However, they are still not running then the system starts, I have to run them manually. I've tried putting an entry in the registry "run" key to run them at start, and that works, but hasn't made any difference to the saving of the settings. One other thing I've noticed since the service was enabled is that the icon does not now appear in the system tray until I use the touchpad, and which point it immediately appears. I have no idea whether that is significant or not!

I installed the ETD Service by running "ETDService.exe -install" at a command prompt, and the service is now installed and appears to be running fine. Unfortunately the settings are still not being saved over a restart. Maybe both ETDCtrlHelper and ETDService have to be running? I will try those modified versions.

Update. I ran the 11.5.20.3 setup program on 8.1 (I installed via the INF previously). This was without uninstalling first. Now the settings are being saved properly over a reboot. The obvious difference is that the Elan Service is now running, which wasn't before, which may be the key process for the proper saving of the settings, rather than ETDCtrlHelper.exe. At least that explains why I hadn't noticed any problem with the settings being saved before, as up until recently, I had always installed using the setup (which won't run on XP of course!)

So sorry @cc333 and @jaclaz. This is really embarrassing, but I've now realised that all is not well on 8.1 with 11.5.20.3 either! The settings are not actually being saved properly there either, they are reverting to the defaults on a restart exactly the same as they are on XP, even with ETDCtrlHelper.exe running! I really don't know what's happening there, and I can't believe that I haven't noticed it until now. If I change the settings and save them they are fine for the rest of that session, but when I reboot they have all reverted to the defaults, which is basically everything enabled. I don't know if the fact that the behaviour is the same in 8.1 and XP is a help or not, but it certainly doesn't seem to depend on whether ETDCtrlHelper.exe is running or not!

I do hope that's as simple as you make it sound! I suspect that the problem will be finding a version which runs happily on XP, and interacts properly with the other files. Just to update, on 8.1 disabling ETDCtrlHelper.exe and rebooting loses the custom settings, and re-enabling it and running it does not bring them back again, even after a reboot. They have to be set up and saved again using the Asus control panel.

Yes, good call @cc333! I tried using 11.5.20.3 on 8.1, and if ETDCtrlHelper.exe is prevented from running, the settings are indeed lost.

That is the obvious assumption, yes. That is a good thought, I will investigate to see if the same thing does happen on 8.1 if ETDCtrlHelper.exe isn't running.

OK, I tried that. I don't have version 10.5.9.0 to hand, but the version in 10.0.5.4, which I do have, seems to be the same version of ETDCtrlHelper.exe (10.0.0.7) so I used that. It's still not running, and seems to still have a missing dependency, this time "ChangeWindowMessageFilter".

Just to confirm, the registry settings are reverting to their defaults even if I just log off and back on again, I don't have to actually reboot.

OK, now back working as before, with rather less clutter in the Elantech folder! Settings still not being saved over a reboot. Only ETDCtrl.exe is now running, as ETDIntelligent.exe isn't present any more of course. ETDCtrlHelper.exe still throwing the same error when run manually.

I tried substituting ETDCtrl.exe and ETDCtrlHelper.exe. Now I'm getting "ETDCtrl.exe has encountered a problem and needs to close".

11.5.4.2 did produce the same result. I've now restored it to the semi-working version, with the files and ETD.sys from 11.4.14.1. This is what I now have - ETDAniConf.exe 11.0.0.7 ETDCtrl.exe 11.0.0.1 (running) ETDCtrlHelper.exe 10.0.0.83 (not running) ETDDeviceInformation.exe 11.1.0.1 ETDIntelligent.exe 11.0.0.6 (running) ETDService.exe 10.0.0.4 (not running) ETDUn_inst.exe 10.0.0.9 ETD_DLL.dll 10.0.0.4 ETDApi.dll 10.0.0.9 ETDApi32.dll 10.0.0.5 ETDApix.dll 10.0.0.111 ETDCmds.dll 10.0.0.96 ETDFavorite.dll 10.0.0.82 ETDMcpl.dll 10.0.0.80 ETDUninst.dll 10.0.0.1 ETD.sys 11.0.0.31 Good to see it so near to working with all version 10 dlls! There are other exe files in the folder, but they are mostly control panels.

I tried copying all the files from 11.5.6.6 across to the Elantech folder, and the driver worked as before. I then tried also copying ETD.sys (version 11.0.0.6) across to system32\drivers and the driver no longer worked. Still no error in Device Manger, but the system tray icon was now "dead". The same two programs are running in the background. I'll download and try with 11.5.4.2 next.

LOL, thanks Jaclaz! As I said to dencorso late last night, the outstanding problem with the driver as it is now is that the settings are not actually being saved. They can be changed, and the touchpad behaviour changes, which is an enormous advance on anything we've had on XP before, but when the system is rebooted the settings go back to the defaults. ETDCtrl.exe is running fine, but instead of ETDCtrlHelper.exe, what is running with it is ETDIntelligent.exe, a program I've never seen running before! If I try to run ETDCtrlHelper.exe, it throws the "UnregisterPowerSettingNotification" could not be found error. ETDIntelligent.exe does not exist in 11.5.20.3, so I can't quite see how it's running, because it can't be mentioned in the INF!

Good idea Den, but we're not quite out of the woods yet! I've now discovered that although I can change the touchpad settings on XP, and they work, they are not being saved properly, because when I reboot they've reverted back to the defaults. We are so close now though that I'm sure this can be resolved. I will pick this up with Jaclaz tomorrow. Cheers, Dave.