Touchscreen fails to respond to taps? Stuck at screen alignment? Read this!

prikolchik · 06-13-08, 05:49 PM

Cleaning the touchscreen.

Problem:
PDA/PocketPC fails screen alignment, does not respond to stylus taps.

It so happens that with time the PDA touchscreen ceases to respond to stylus taps without apparent reason. On the screen there are no evident mechanical damage, and once again, preforming Hard Reset (reset to factory default settings with complete data loss) you can not pass the touchscreen alignment procedure. Either that or the touchscreen will need to be frequently re-aligned, as from time to time it seems to loses calibration/alignment settings.

Solution:
Before sending your PDA to a service center you should try to clean the touchscreen yourself. For cleaning the PDA screen you can use any object that is made out of thick paper, for example, a business card or a bus ticket.

Step 0. Before you do anything, just make sure HOLD/LOCK button on the PDA is in UNLOCK position, and make sure you have tried to Soft Reset the device.

Step 1. First of all we will try to remove protective screen film from the PDA touchscreen, since it could have deformed over time. WARNING! You may remove protective screen only if it is installed on the PDA touchscreen. There were cases when user confused protective screen with a layer of the touchscreen, called digitizer (a piece of computer hardware used to convert analogue data into digital format (understand stylus taps)). In any case do NOT use sharp cutting objects such as knives, razor blades, etc, for removing the protective screen. The best way to do this is to use a pair of tweezers. Carefully, so as not to damage the digitizer, try to grab a corner of the touchscreen protective film with the tweezers.

Step 2. Separate protective screen film from the PDA touchscreen.

Step 3. After complete removal of the protective screen, turn the PDA on and try to align the screen. Do this only if you could not align the screen at all. If it works, you can stop here, and if doesn't -- proceed to Step 4.

Step 4. If the above step did not help, take a business card and insert a corner of it in the gap between the touchscreen and the PDA case. Then swipe the card along the perimeter of the touchscreen in order to remove the dust particles and dirt. We have to do this, because dirt slightly bends/deforms the touchscreen and thereby causing the pressure on the digitizer, which it interprets as taps.

Step 5. If neither Hard Reset, removing protective screen film nor cleaning of the touchscreen had helped, then you may either contact a service center (such as PPCTechs) to carry out further diagnosis and repair of the PDA OR try to replace the faulty screen digitizer yourself. It involves taking apart the PDA, removing the touchscreen, and replacing the digitizer (the transparent film on the screen). You can get a new digitizer on ebay for about $15 USD (including shipping). To find a digitizer just fire up a search on ebay, for example "dell x51 digitizer".

I hope this article helps someone.

Translated by me with minor adjustments from Russian

Sunnyside_One · 06-16-08, 04:01 PM

The screen on my Axim X5 also failed to respond to taps. Before doing any more advanced procedures, I did a hard reset again and then removed both batteries. I then inserted the stylus in the reset hole while holding down the on/off switch for about 30 seconds. This was something I've been told to do on regular desktop and laptop computers when I've called Dell support. It drains the last of the power from the capacitors (or whatever) in the unit. I put the batteries back in and did the alignment procedure and the rest of the setup and it was as good as new. (minus my loaded programs and data of course) Maybe I was just lucky, but this worked for me! I had been chasing those alignment points around and around and around... LOL

astibo · 06-17-08, 05:14 PM

Thanks thanks thanks thanksssss
it works perfectly