Why does my trackpad fire random clicks when I scroll with two fingers?

Question

I have an HP Spectre 360 (model 13-4193nr) running Windows 10.

I noticed that whenever I scroll using two fingers on the trackpad, it scrolls fine, but it also fires unexpected clicks (left clicks) whenever I use it. This happens randomly in all applications. After some testing, I realized that it fires an extraneous click whenever I scroll down and then immediately up, and vice versa. That's only one of the triggers, however; I couldn't tell what the other triggers are after a lot of experimentation. I've also verified my finger movements to make sure I'm not doing any other gestures that are supposed to fire clicks.

This is a bigger problem than I expected because while I can try to prevent my cursor from being near a button I don't want clicked, my trackpad (occasionally, not always) also moves the cursor up and down whenever I scroll, in the opposite direction I scroll (same direction as my fingers). That's probably a separate issue, and I'll likely ask a different question about it.

Also, I don't run into any of these issues when I use my touchscreen to scroll.

Answer 1

It sounds like a problem with the scroll acceleration. Due to the way touch pads work, they detect how many fingers are on them and where they are moving, and then try to figure out what you are doing based on the settings for acceleration and sensitivity. Try playing around with the touch pad acceleration under mouse settings in windows, and maybe turning the sensitivity down. Another guess is that when you switch directions, your finger slightly lifts off the touch pad and then goes back down, registering a click. If this is the case, there's not much you can do, other than adjust the sensitivity.