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| Here's the palmrest from one of my T41 parts systems. On the left is what you normally see. Flip the entire palmrest assembly over and you can see both the touchpad (green circuit board) and the button assembly (metal frame surrounding the touchpad). You can see that the metal frame containing the buttons has an IBM FRU of 93P4696. At this time there are several eBay sellers which are advertising this part number. Some of them are only selling the button assembly and other sellers seem to be including the touchpad. Note: All pictures are clickable for a larger, 800 x 600 pixel image. | |
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| Remove the four screws holding down the button assembly, peel the orange tape off of the ribbon cable, pull the ribbon cable out of the connector just above the FRU, tilt up the metal frame and slide it off of the plastic tab at the "top" and this is what you get. Turn the button assembly over and you can see that the plastic buttons have a long arm which extends almost to the opposite side of the metal frame. | |
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| Release the arm from the metal frame by bending it slightly outward. This enables you to swing the button up and pivot it forward so you can see where the actual rubber buttons are. Be careful! The buttons are loose! | |
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| The rubber buttons just sit inside the plastic base, covering the actual switch surface. If there's any contamination under the rubber it could affect the performance of the button. Likewise, if there's anything which obstructs the button from swinging around the two ends of the wire hinge, then that can impact the function of the buttons. The right picture shows the Synaptics touchpad board in the palmrest. It basically just sits inside the plastic frame; it's not secured by any screws. Neither does it appear to have any IBM FRU associated with it. | |