Mouse Pointer Gives Problems

[John Cluster]

Running Windows XP. The problem I am currently having may or may not be
related to my recent installation of a new HP printer, but this is what I
started to experience after the installation:

The mouse pointer "Working In Background" (an arrow in combination with an
hourglass) started to appear in regular intervals of 25-30 seconds with the
hourglass trembling rapidly for about a second. This is a non-stop process
in all the situations when the "Normal Select" pointer (a regular arrow) is
functionally present as a current active pointer, regardless of the
application used: Windows Explorer, Internet Explorer, PowerPoint, etc. The
problem does not exist when there is any other pointer currently active,
such as "Text Select", "Link Select", "Move", "Resize", etc.- they would
never turn into the trembling "Working In Background" pointer.

You can work OK in Word, Excel, even PowerPoint, when you are in the
write/edit mode, but once you have the "Normal Select" pointer condition,
even on the same page, the problem starts right away.

Needless to say, it is annoying and very destructive. Besides, it shows
some kind of looping, resource consuming CPU activity, and I don't know what
it is.

I will be looking forward to any suggestion you might offer, and I want to
thank you in advance.

John Cluster

 

[Chuck]

The HP printer driver may have included a monitor module. These modules
generally run in background, and may be the source of your problem. It may
be possible to turn such a module off using a printer driver option. Another
possibility (mainly for diagnostic purposes) might be to use task manager to
shut down such a monitor utility.
Getting rid of such a module usually involves renaming it, seeing if there
are complaints ( module not found, etc.) and disabling the load of the
module. (msconfig, My computer managment, etc. can usually be used to
prevent loading of the module.)