Out of control laptop mouse

[cruiseroutfit]

The cursor/mouse on my Dell laptop will all of a sudden go out of control for ~10 seconds, opening things, closing things, moving things, bounces all over the screen. I havn't added any new hardare or anything?

I can't even use the thing, I tried to do a virus scan, and it goes into "whack" before I can get it to scan the entire computer. Then it has so many programs open (like literally every shortcut on my desktop) that the computer has frozen up a time or two.

Thoughts???

 

[Rusted]

Do you have two mouse options on your laptop? You could try to enable one disable the other in the bios to see if you can isolate which one is the problem. Or disable them all and use an external mouse to see if that fixes the problem.

Sounds like you are still trying to figure out if it is a hardware problem or a virus problem.

 

[mbryson]

Boot it in 'safe' mode and see if it appears there.

 

[scoutabout]

Yeah, try an external mouse to narrow down the probelm. Disable the pad. I had a Dell C600 that had a similar problem. Something was broken in the housing, and the pad was getting false input.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Thanks guys! I will try and that and report back...

How do I boot in SAFE mode?

 

[Rusted]

while booting press the F8 key. right when the bios is done and the windows is starting start tappinig on the F8

 

[Caleb]

Is this with an external mouse or the track pad? If it's an external mouse is it optical?

 

[Brett]

Is this with an external mouse or the track pad? If it's an external mouse is it optical?

I was wondering about that too. My optical is getting up there in age and it likes to go wandering across the screen now and then.

 

[Caleb]

I was wondering about that too. My optical is getting up there in age and it likes to go wandering across the screen now and then.

Some opticals are also very picky about the surface they are on, the wrong kind of wood grain, the wrong mouse pad, or if it's wireless dying batteries can cause this exact symptom.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

This is the built in setup.

My laptop has two systems, one is the touch pad, the other is the "button" in the middle of the keyboard...

I need to go pick up a USB mouse (my other one has vanished) so I can disable both of the built in units.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

A couple of updates...

1. I have tried both "sets" of mouses built into the laptop, even with one or the other disabled, it still occurs.

2. I have a USB mouse plugged in and so far no problems, however it wont let me disable the other mouse functions on the computer from the control panel. So if it does occur again, I still can't be sure...

Thanks again foks!

 

[cruiseroutfit]

It hasn't appeared in the last hour or so using my USB mouse. I am going to unplug it and see what happens when I go back to the normal mouse operation.

 

[Caleb]

something thats worth trying if it comes back is to find the mouse drivers for your laptop and reload them if you can. Drivers going corrupt seem to be quite common, worth a shot atleast

BTW, if you need a USB mouse let me know, I have a Logitech optical (pretty nice actually) I'm not using that you are welcome to.

 

[projektdotnet]

Hey Kurt...Call me next time you're having problems you know I work on computers

 

[Brad J]

I've had several Dell laptops that had bad touchpads causing the cursor to drift off w/ a mind of its own. I've replaced the palmrest on them and haven't had any problems after that. Your's could be a different case

Where's Wayne, he works on these daily and knows about their problems?

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Bump...

So I purchased a new keyboard for my laptop, it has the new "mouse" built into the middle of the keyboard. But, how do I turn that mouse back on? If I go to "mouse" in the control panel I can't find a place?? Any ideas? It did this even before I switched the keyboard so I'm certain it isn't a bad replacement.

 

[Rusted]

is it turned on in the bios?

 

[cruiseroutfit]

is it turned on in the bios?

I couldn't remember where I turned them off. How do I get into the bios? F8 at startup or does that just launch me in SAFE mode?

EDIT: They are enabled in the bios...

When I disabled them originally I could swear I did it in the control panel, it let me disable just the touchpad, the touchpad buttons, the pointerstick, or the pointerstick buttons... or any combination of those. I disabled all of them, but can't find that screen anymore???

 

[Brad J]

F2

 

[StrobeNGH]

Whatever you do, don't start deleting programs off your computer.

I can't wait to activate the remote desktop and start screwing around with you again.