Hello all, It works! Having found a 'how I got Ubuntu to work on my HP 510' article (http://arewold.wordpress.com/2007/05/26/installing-ubuntu-704-on-a-hp-510-la...) I followed instructions to make a small change to the kernel (forcing the outcome of a check that was presumably going wrong, I think). My custom kernel boots it with the touchpad working as hoped. dmesg now includes: input: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad as /class/input/input3 Thanks for all your help, Matthew