To disable a strip at the bottom, you'd use synclient AreaBottomEdge=xxx, where xxx is a number which is less then the vertical width of the touchpad.
For example, on my Dell mini 10 (1010) with an Elantech touchpad, I had to use the following:
synclient AreaBottomEdge=690
...while the touchpad dimentions are:
~$ cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep range
[    24.008] (--) synaptics: ETPS/2 Elantech Touchpad: x-axis range 0 - 1152
[    24.008] (--) synaptics: ETPS/2 Elantech Touchpad: y-axis range 0 - 768
You can use AreaLeftEdge, AreaRightEdge and AreaTopEdge options in a similar manner, if needed. 
To make the change permanent, I had to create /etc/X11/xorg.conf with the folloing content:
Section "InputClass"
        Identifier "ETPS/2 Elantech Touchpad"
        MatchProduct "ETPS/2 Elantech Touchpad"
        MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event*"
        Driver "synaptics"
        Option "AreaBottomEdge" "690"
        Option "AreaRightEdge" "1070"
        Option "AreaLeftEdge" "110"
EndSection
PS: You can find out how your Mini 10v's touchpad is identified by looking at the Xorg log info - 
cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep touch.