Please help - my mouse pointer 'eats' my screen!!

[bump]

I know it sounds strange and to be honest I dont really know how to explain what's going on let alone how to fix it!

My PC is suffering from an intermittent fault which manifests itself with the mouse pointer acting like it's possessed! At first it only seemed to happen when I was on very complex web pages so I learned the ones to avoid (like the QVC web page - which is worth avoiding anyway) and stuck to the 'plainer' sites. If I did hit a site that my mouse/PC 'didnt like', the pointer would stop moving, any thing that was loading up onto the screen would suddenly grind to a halt and when I moved the mouse, the pointer would dash around the screen in directions bearing no relation to the mouse movement and leave a trail of 'eaten' screen behind it - either revealing what was there previously or just black boxes. The bar at the bottom of the screen would be semi revealed if it went to the bottom of the screen but all the icons on it were showed as black empty spaces. Ctrl+alt+del wouldnt even display the task mgr window and if it did try it would show as a series of lines, but with no control over the mouse, it was impossible to select any option or just simply close the session down.

It didnt happen for a while but recently, when I wasnt even logged onto the web, I was viewing some large photographs. When I double clicked on them to display them full size, everything started to freeze and the mouse refused to respond, then off it went munching it's way through my display.

The only way I've found out of this is to hit the power switch and shut everything down, then reboot and start again. The problem is that in some sessions I'm having to do this almost every 15 minutes or so which is a real pain, and because it seems to be so unpredictable now I have no faith in my PC and am refraining from doing anything important on it in case it all goes horribley wrong!

I've trawled the web for any info about this type of phenomena, but as I dont even know how to describe it properly (as you probably have already realised!) it's difficult to locate any help. If any of you PC gods out there could help me out I would really appreciate it! I'm tempted to just go and buy a new PC but there has to be a better way of solving this than replacing everything??!!

I'm just glad my PC has let me get onto this site and write up my cry for help without throwing a wobbler, mind you I have to scroll down now and hit the send button.......

 

[Me__2001]

have you tried scanning for viruses?, it sounds kinda familiar

 

[floppybootstomp]

Aliens ate my desktop

Yep, sounds like a virus alright.

 

[muckshifter]

when I was on very complex web pages so I learned the ones to avoid, like the QVC

I bet nobody here has a problem with QVC ... complex web pages? What do you mean?

Yes, it could be a virus, so use an on-line scan such as HouseCall ... however, it could be a bad video driver or driver hardware fault.

I had great fun with a PC one day ... everything would be fine, the next minuete everytime you moved the mouse the screen area that the mouse passed over blanked out ... but you did have to move the mouse. That was a faulty video card.

Check for virus and malware.

 

[itsme]

I had great fun with a PC one day ... everything would be fine, the next minuete
So you do ballet as well ay Mucks

 

[ChristopherP]

I had great fun with a PC one day

 

[muckshifter]

Mock all you like ... he who laughs last, laughs the longest.

 

[itsme]

Mock all you like ... he who laughs last, laughs the longest.

He He How are you anyway Mucks

 

[bodhi]

Im with mucks here, i would suggest trying a different video card.

 

[bump]

Tried several different virus checkers and all come back clean. Zone Alarm seems to be doing it's blocking job well enough and there's a pop up blocker on the PC too.

I was wondering if it was some sort of memory problem or prioriry setting issue on the mouse driver?

If it's a video card problem - what should I go for? I dont want to buy another one and end up with the same problem again!!

Cheers

 

[bodhi]

When i used to get problems like this i had a trusty old ISA video card that worked with everything!! You could try just buying a really cheap card for like a tenner just to see if that solves the problem before you splash out on a full on card. Or, could you not borrow a card off a mate and try that?