Aggravating Issue with Mouse Pointer

[Guest]

I'm having an issue with my mouse pointer. It is continuously flashing in
the 'working in background' mode, even when I don't have any programs running
and it is just sitting idle on the desktop. The only time it goes away is
when I click on something and it is loading or if I'm hovering over a link on
the internet. Any clues why this could be happening? The constant back and
forth flashing is getting really annoying.

 

[Jabez Gan [MVP]]

When did this start to happen? If you do a reboot, do you see the same
issue?

Also please make sure that you are using the latest graphic card drirver.

 

[Charlie Tame]

I'm having an issue with my mouse pointer. It is continuously flashing in
the 'working in background' mode, even when I don't have any programs running
and it is just sitting idle on the desktop. The only time it goes away is
when I click on something and it is loading or if I'm hovering over a link on
the internet. Any clues why this could be happening? The constant back and
forth flashing is getting really annoying.

Is the disk drive light flashing too? Maybe it is "Indexing" and you can
right click on the drive icon, select properties and uncheck a box to
stop that. "Allegedly" this slows down searching for things but
considering the search function in standard setup is awesomely pathetic
anyway you won't lose anything and it will at least eliminate this one
issue.

 

[Guest]

It started about two weeks ago. I've restarted my computer several times
since then and it continues to happen. At first it would go away after an
hour or so, but then that time became longer. Like today I have had my
computer on for about 7 hours and it is still doing it.

I'll have to check on the graphic card driver though. I just didn't have
any clue where to start.

 

[Andre Da Costa[ActiveWin]]

Have you tried other pointing devices? Is it a USB or PS/2 type mouse? Have
you plugged into other ports on the system?

 

[Guest]

It's a USB mouse and I've tried both unplugging it completely and switching
ports, but it didn't fix anything.

 

[Andre Da Costa[ActiveWin]]

Sounds like its the mouse then, which brand is it?

 

[Charlie Tame]

It's a USB mouse and I've tried both unplugging it completely and switching
ports, but it didn't fix anything.

Did you look at the disk drive light to see if there are very brief
flashes? If the pointer keeps changing to indicate that the PC is "Busy"
then it probably is "Busy" - the light may offer a clue. Whatever is
causing this activity is likely to be your problem...

 

[Guest]

Nope, the disk drive doesn't flash at all, not even like once or twice in a
minute. And that's just the thing, I really can't figure out what could be
running. Even when I turn on the computer and not a single program is
running, it's still flashing.

 

[Guest]

It's a Sony VAIO mouse, but I don't think it's the problem because like I
said - even when I completely disconnect the mouse from my computer, the
cursor is still flashing.

 

[Guest]

Check to see if there is an updated driver for your mouse, or reinstall the
driver to see if that corrects the problem.

 

[Guest]

This disk light isn't flashing at all. Not even a few times. I tried going
under properties anyway and checking off indexing, but I couldn't find that
choice anywhere.

 

[Alias]

This disk light isn't flashing at all. Not even a few times. I tried going
under properties anyway and checking off indexing, but I couldn't find that
choice anywhere.

What happens if you use a different mouse?

 

[Charlie Tame]

Okay, well see if you can "Guess" what is going on by looking in task
manager, you know, the thing that pops up when you ctrl/alt/del.

If you click on the column headers where it says "CPU" it will list the
tasks running in order, click again the order is reversed. When you get
that listing CPU use in order, you may be able to see a task that keeps
popping up at the top of the list.

The names of the tasks don't usually describe the task too well but if
you can associate a name with the icon changes then that is the one that
is causing the "Busy" signal and maybe it something you can stop or adjust.

Don't remove or stop anything without asking first unless you are sure
what it is.

I don't think the mouse has anything to do with this, the mouse pointer
is just the "Flag" that indicates "Busy"... it is what's causing the
busy signal you want to find, although bear in mind I'm not always right

 

[Guest]

Wow I didn't even think to look there. My CPU usage is staying in between
80-90. When I follow the steps you said these two programs were the highest:

MSASCui.exe - Windows Defender User Interface
hpcmpmgr.exe - HP Framework Component Manager Service

The first was staying about 40 and the second was bouncing back and forth
between 7 and 14.

I don't really know much about either of these things, would they be safe to
remove?

 

[Charlie Tame]

Aha, well I have disabled defender on a couple of machines, though I
didn't notice the mouse pointer thing happening I did notice the speed
problem.

If you look in the settings pages and find "Services" you should be able
to set the HP thing to manual start and after "Apply" you should be able
to stop the service and see what happens. Try defender first and see
what happens, I suggest you don't do these from task manager although it
really shouldn't hurt anything.

 

[folderann]

Not a real fix but I found that the problem went away when I took my
two side toolbars off of autohide. I noticed the mouse went crazy
when i moved into the side area of the screen.

Vista sucks.