Creeping cursor

[Tom Brown]

I have a Dell Inspiron laptop with an Alps Touchpad and a Microsoft USB
Wireless Optical Intelli Point mouse.

A few days ago, my cursor started acting very strangely. It now has a mind
of it's own. I don't know if it is related to either the mouse or touchpad
but I thought I would throw the quesiton out to you gurus.

At times, the mouse will just "take off" at a diagonal (up/right or
down/left) slow crawl until it hits the edge of the screen and then it
crawls left or right until it gets to the corner. If I move the cursor
(with the mouse or or Touch Pad) it will allow itself to be pulled, but when
I stop moving it, it crawls right back to where it came from.

I have updated my antivirus program (Kaspersky) every three hours and I am
at a loss. Any help will be appreciated.

Thanks,

Tom

 

[jeffrey]

Hi,

I have seen that problem on a few optical mouse that are not used on mouse
pads. It seems to happen on certain types of surfaces that it rests on. I
don`t know if thats the reason for your problem though.

Jeff

 

[guest]

It's a documented problem. Check Dell's forums. I had this problem at random
times. I just tap the touchpad and it usually stops.

 

[baldric]

It's a documented problem. Check Dell's forums. I had this problem at random
times. I just tap the touchpad and it usually stops.

I've got the same problem and from the previous posts (I don't use a
mouse pad) that might be the solution to the problem.

 

[Bob I]

Uncheck "Enhanced Pointer Precision" in Mouse properties, Pointer Options.

 

[Tom Brown]

Actually, the fix was rather simple. That was one of the most annoying
problems I have ever had with a computer. I went into
Start/Run/Msconfig/Startup and selected "Disable All" and it immediately
solved the problem. I then went back into the Startup panel and reselected
the items I know I need (antivirus, MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, etc) and
it still works fine.

Something must have creeped into that startup routine what caused it to
screw up the mouse cursor but I don't know what it was. I am just very happy
it's now gone.

Tom