Touch Pad Broken? Shuffle Firmwear?

[dal_rai]

I have tried everything I could to recover the now broken touch pad so I could go up and down to chose my songs! Well I can only now start and get into my Music folder becuase its the first folder in im list not being able to up and down i alsways have to go into it and then it leads into an unknown file with some songs in it. This sorta sucked hard cuz my Z5 was now rendered usless, but now I have been thinking of a firmwear which makes a Z5 into a Suffle of all your songs instead of being rendered..... usless. So why cant they make a firmwear that makes your Z5 start then go into shuffle folder first so u can listen to all your songs insdead of 7 mixed up in a stupid unkown folder! If this exists plz help me this could help many people if the tuch pad starts to go on many peoples Z5s. If not anyone have suggestions?

[CrowdAds]

[Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander]

First try to reinstall the firmware. I'm not sure why, but some have found this corrects the problem. If not, open it and lift up the touch pad to make sure it is free and the isn't a physical (rather than electrical) problem you are having.

Still nothing, then you might have to incorrectly tag your music so that they are all under the same Artist, etc, so that the one list you end up with contains all songs. Unless the Z5 was set to playback in a shuffled order before it began playing up, then the list will have a fixed order, but you can still use the skip buttons to play every song, however tedious it will be.

Or if you are prepared to pay for it you could always send it back to Samsung for repairs.

[emice]

I just bought a "like new" Z5 on ebay and it arrived w/ the touchpad not working. It would respond intermittently when tapped and scratched at chaotically, but getting the menu cursor to move down was nearly impossible. Updated the firmware to 2.47 and now it works, but if I am not slow and deliberate enough with my presses, it sometimes misses them. I have a question for all the users who "fixed" their touchpads with a firmware update, does it feel just as tactile? I'm wondering if the firmware just got smarter at interpreting the signals from a touchpad that is losing calibration or failing in some way.

I will probably open it up, re-seat the connector and make sure everything is snug like I saw recommended in another post. If I see a further improvement after that, I'll post back here.

This Z5 came with the battery completely discharged, and it has probably been that way since who knows when. I hope that sitting dead like that didn't adversely affect its capacity too much. It wouldn't power up connected to USB at first but after a few min of charging came to life. Now that it reports a full charge I connected the player to a power amp/speakers and am playing a long list of songs without interruption and the screen off. If I don't get at least 20 hours out of this "like new" z5 w/o using the display I might ask for my money back.

There is a source for the battery on froogle/google products, just key in the battery model # from samsung's website into froogle. But $40 shipped for a battery is too much. I wouldn't mind cutting and re-attaching wires to the original connector if I can find a generic pack that fits, for more like $10-15. Someone should dissect the battery and take pics + post dimensions so a battery expert can chime in on what might work. If I open mine up I will measure things and take some macro shots of the connector. The pics in another thread seem to suggest the dimensions of the battery are about 1.25" x 2.75" with an unknown thickness.

[emice]

NEW 850mAh Battery for SONY CLIE PEG-TJ25/TJ25U/TJ35/TJ35U PDA
http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-Battery-for-...QQcmdZViewItem

Looks like it should just fit -
Type Li-Polymer
Weight 27g
Dimensions 2.50"x1.38"x0.13"
Voltage 3.7V
Capacity 850mAh

It says it has its own ic chip to regulate charge/discharge. $10 shipped to boot. How risky is it to put this in? Same voltage, size, chemistry and capacity.

4th generation ipod battery looks promising too, I've seen 1200mah packs for them, but they are thicker I think, and I don't know how thick the z5 can take.

[Lifter59]

Originally Posted by dal_rai

I have tried everything I could to recover the now broken touch pad so I could go up and down to chose my songs! Well I can only now start and get into my Music folder becuase its the first folder in im list not being able to up and down i alsways have to go into it and then it leads into an unknown file with some songs in it. This sorta sucked hard cuz my Z5 was now rendered usless, but now I have been thinking of a firmwear which makes a Z5 into a Suffle of all your songs instead of being rendered..... usless. So why cant they make a firmwear that makes your Z5 start then go into shuffle folder first so u can listen to all your songs insdead of 7 mixed up in a stupid unkown folder! If this exists plz help me this could help many people if the tuch pad starts to go on many peoples Z5s. If not anyone have suggestions?

If you are willing to spend $15 you can get the service manual here:
http://www.manualsparadise.com/ReWri...SI.M87735996#1

And the parts here:
http://www.partstore.com/Model/Samsu...YPZ5ASXAA.aspx

I have made a few repairs and if you are brave enough it shouldn't be a major effort.

[dal_rai]

Thats a huge help thanks very much! One thing though is why dont they make a firmwear where teh up botton can go to the Z artists when u go one up from A. It sucks becuase if only my down buttons broken and If i when i start the artist A-Z I can go directly to Z by pressing up from A, so scrolling backwards is availible instead of going ABCD U can go AZYX bla bla bla. If this exists plz tell me And if you can make it happen I love u !

[goriath]

There is the possibility that your touchpad is not broken, but it needs to be cleaned. I got Z5F with *broken touchpad* from eBay for few bucks. It had the same problem like yours. After cleaning, mine now is working...

I disassembled all the parts of Z5, touchpad too. On the touchpad upper side, there is an adesive tap showing symbols UP and DOWN. I removed it from the rest using a little screw driver. Be patient and pay attention when removing. Under adesive tap you can find resistor circuit, this needs to be clenead with alcohol. I suggest to clean under the adesive tap also, the part that makes contact with the resistor circuit. Clean only the center, there is adesive on the corners, so if you clean the corners too, after the tap couldn't stick on the rest of touchpad... When done, put together again all the parts and try...

I have attached a picture that shows adesive tap corners; the red arrow show you the way to enter with screw driver:

Please, forget my bad english....very bad performance this time, anyway I hope that you are able to understand what I wrote...

[Mango]

Goriath,
Your picture shows the player with the front removed. I had no problem removing the back but I'm having difficulty with the front. Is there a trick to remove the front? Thank you in advance!
Mango

[ibrook]

Mango,
I tried to open it up and I also had difficulty with the front. It's cause there is glue on it. My dad just really carefully pried it out and the glue will come off ^_^;; Just make sure it doesn't break.

Also...even after I opened it up and cleaned it up (did this process twice) the touchpad still doesn't work..and now my screen doesn't auto-turn off .. just a warning to everyone planning to open it up. You should try it (cause after my first try it DID work for about 10 minutes) but do it CAREFULLY and good luck!

[dal_rai]

So with the picture do you peal back the the red touch pad and clean under there??

[goriath]

Originally Posted by Mango

Goriath,
Your picture shows the player with the front removed. I had no problem removing the back but I'm having difficulty with the front. Is there a trick to remove the front? Thank you in advance!
Mango

Sorry for the delay...

When you remove the backside look at the PCB, there are two tiny screws; remove them in order to remove the front...

[Mango]

Goriath,
Thanks for the tip. I'll let you know how it goes later.
Mango

[Mango]

Oh well,
After separating the top touch pad and separating the underlying resistor "maze", and cleaning all but the corners of every surface, the touchpad still doesn't work.
Mango

[goriath]

Originally Posted by Mango

Oh well,
After separating the top touch pad and separating the underlying resistor "maze", and cleaning all but the corners of every surface, the touchpad still doesn't work.
Mango

Sad to read about that But on my *used* Z5 it has worked...

[ren135]

hey goriath,
I had a similar problem with my touchpad. I followed your advice, opened it, and found a bit of dirt under the tape. I cleaned it with some alcohol pads and now it works perfectly again. I am SO relieved! Thanks!

[dal_rai]

There is a way to not just toss out your mp3 or listen to one artist! With WMP11 you can design a custom artist like a album but you can moe whatever you want into this in any order to make a play list that you can have and change! I was listening to album by album when i couldnt move down to pick any other artists. so yeah pretty much you can make big or small playlists if you have a unorganized wmp11 personaly i really like the itunes visulizer( i wonder why ) :P and its pretty simply lid out not so exstravigant but if you use both or whatever wmp can make playlists for you to enjoy instead of your mp3 sitting in your drawer. Happy days! This is my solution best bet is maybe to jsut get it fixed if u can be botheres ( im to lazy ) (i winder why) Peace

[intrepid]

You can also try this site for manuals: https://www.manualuniverse.com

[iampiti]

My Z5 had been working like a champ for four years. Recently the touch pad stopped working and I just came across this. I already have a new player but it might be interesting to try and repair it

[heartfaced]

yes try to open it. i'm not a techy person myself but was able to fix the touchpad. it even get more responsive than before