Comment 55 for bug 1021517

I can confirm that the crash depends on the fn-f8 combo to activate/disable the touchpad.
The interesting thing is that it doesnt matter if the touchpad is actually active or not. If I disable/enable the touchpad via terminal [synclient touchpadoff=1/0] it doesnt crash as long as the touchpad isn't deactivated via fn-f8.
I'm usually using the trackpoint so i didnt notice this behaviour before.

Steps to reproduce:
1) activate the touchpad via fn-f8
2) create a new image in gimp and try out some tools -> no crash happens
[ 3) deactivate touchpad via terminal -> no crash ]
4) deactivate the touchpad via fn-f8 and click on the gimp workspace -> xserver crashes instantly
     (reactivating the touchpad via terminal before pressing fn-f8 doesnt change the result)

Some further tests:

1) Deactivating the touchpad in the bios:
       a) only trackpoint -> no crash (pressing fn-f8 has obviously no effect as no touchpad is active)
       b) trackpoint and a simple external mouse -> same as above

2) Deactivating the trackpoint in the bios:
       a) only touchpad -> obviuosly can't click on the gimp workspace if the touchpad is disabled, so no way to tell
       b) touchpad and external mouse -> crash once you follow the steps described above.

3) Using external mouse, trackpoint and trackpad
     -> crash if you click with mouse or trackpoint once the touchpad is deactivated using fn-f8

Well, it really seems to be related to the touchpad or rather it's deactivation using the keycombo.

As a workaround, you can simply activate your touchpad via fn-f8 and keep it on, deactivate it via teminal or diable it in the bios of your laptop.