Mouse + Pad Are Unreliable

Ed McCauley · Aug 4, 2024

Dell Precision 3541 Core i7 Gen 9 2.60Ghz 16GB memory
Win11 Pro v.23H2 64 bit Mouse Logitec G600 + Laptop Touchpad

My mouse will wok fine for 20 minutes or so, then it starts flinging itself all over the screen when I try to select something. When I manage to get it where I want it, it almost never activates whatever control I want. Unplugging (it's a corded mouse) and replugging it in restarts the mouse and sometimes it now works. After 45 minutes of misbehaving it once again works fine. With the Mouse unplugged the Mouse Pad has the same issue as the external logitec.

All Mouse drivers are up to date. Memory and CPU usage are normal, and no app will definitely cause the mouse problem. Could it be a laptop hardware issue?

Thanks for any assistance...

iko22 · Aug 4, 2024

What happens if you disable the touchpad, and just use mouse? You can disable teh touchpad by one of two ways:

How To Disable Touchpad On Dell Laptop | Robots.net

Learn how to disable the touchpad on your Dell laptop with our step-by-step guide. Say goodbye to accidental cursor movements and experience a more seamless typing experience.

robots.net

Ed McCauley · Aug 4, 2024

iko22 said:
What happens if you disable the touchpad, and just use mouse? You can disable teh touchpad by one of two ways:

How To Disable Touchpad On Dell Laptop | Robots.net

Learn how to disable the touchpad on your Dell laptop with our step-by-step guide. Say goodbye to accidental cursor movements and experience a more seamless typing experience.

robots.net

Thanks for the idea, but 10 minutes after disabling the Mousepad, the same old problems returned. Windows is unusable without a mouse no matter how many shortcuts I know...

iko22 · Aug 4, 2024

Ed McCauley said:
Windows is unusable without a mouse no matter how many shortcuts I know...

Can you not use the mouse without the mousepad on your laptop?

Ed McCauley · Aug 4, 2024

iko22 said:
Can you not use the mouse without the mousepad on your laptop?

With the Mousepad "off" the Logitec External mouse works fine -- until it fails -- with the same symptoms noted in the previous posts. In other words, with the Mousepad disabled I still have the same issue with the external mouse.

iko22 · Aug 4, 2024

Ed McCauley said:
With the Mousepad "off" the Logitec External mouse works fine -- until it fails -- with the same symptoms noted in the previous posts. In other words, with the Mousepad disabled I still have the same issue with the external mouse.

Okay. Understood. Would try an anti-virus/malware scan or a clean boot next, to see if the issue is software-related.

Perform a Clean Boot in Windows 11 to Troubleshoot Software Conflicts Tutorial

This tutorial will show you how to perform a clean boot to start Windows 10 or Windows 11 using a minimal set of drivers and startup programs for troubleshooting application conflicts. Troubleshooting Windows can be a complex process due to the many different drivers, settings, and programs...

www.elevenforum.com

Before you attempt those, you could also try entering the Laptop's BIOS upon start-up, then give the mouse/touchpad a wiggle, and see if symptoms persist in BIOS (ie, without the OS loaded).

abactuon · Aug 4, 2024

Try a different mouse.
There are few settings for the mouse in Windows, the main ones being:

Turn Off Enhance Pointer Precision
Settings > Bluetooth&devices > Mouse > Additional mouse settings > Mouse properties > Pointer Options > Enhance pointer precision : Off

Disable Touchpad when a Mouse is Connected
Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Touchpad > Leave touchpad on when a mouse is connected : "Off"

Do you have proprietary software for your mouse and have you customized your mouse?

Many mice have a CPI (counts per ich) toggle button.

Ed McCauley · Aug 4, 2024

iko22 said:
Okay. Understood. Would try an anti-virus/malware scan or a clean boot next, to see if the issue is software-related.

Perform a Clean Boot in Windows 11 to Troubleshoot Software Conflicts Tutorial

This tutorial will show you how to perform a clean boot to start Windows 10 or Windows 11 using a minimal set of drivers and startup programs for troubleshooting application conflicts. Troubleshooting Windows can be a complex process due to the many different drivers, settings, and programs...

www.elevenforum.com

Before you attempt those, you could also try entering the Laptop's BIOS upon start-up, then give the mouse/touchpad a wiggle, and see if symptoms persist in BIOS (ie, without the OS loaded).

When in any part of the BIOS the Mouse and Touchpad are disabled. But it was a good idea.

Re-did a/v scans - no issues detected.

Will do a clean boot later when I finish my current job. Thanks for the link to the Clean Boot procedure!

Ed McCauley · Aug 4, 2024

abactuon said:
Try a different mouse.
There are few settings for the mouse in Windows, the main ones being:

Turn Off Enhance Pointer Precision
Settings > Bluetooth&devices > Mouse > Additional mouse settings > Mouse properties > Pointer Options > Enhance pointer precision : Off

Disable Touchpad when a Mouse is Connected
Settings > Bluetooth & devices > Touchpad > Leave touchpad on when a mouse is connected : "Off"

Do you have proprietary software for your mouse and have you customized your mouse?

Many mice have a CPI (counts per ich) toggle button.

Thanks for the reply,

Plain old generic plug-in Mouse - same issues.

Enhanced pointer precision was already selected off.

Disable Touchpad when a Mouse is Connected - N/A

Do you have proprietary software for your mouse? - Yes for the Logitec G600, and all custom options are OFF.
The Dell Touchpad driver is just a generic HID-compliant mouse. According to Advanced Driver Updater both are up to date.

Many mice have a CPI (counts per ich) toggle button - This one does not.

All are good ideas, but still have the same issues. Could it be the computer's internal mouse-related hardware?

iko22 · Aug 4, 2024

Ed McCauley said:
When in any part of the BIOS the Mouse and Touchpad are disabled. But it was a good idea.

Strange. When I said BIOS, I meant UEFI as Windows 11 requires UEFI BIOS (not legacy BIOS) to be enabled. Your laptop supports UEFI only (ie, no legacy mode supported).

Reference:

Precision 3541 is not showing legacy or uefi: | DELL Technologies

I have a precision 3541 and it has no option: legacy or uefi: i was trying to boot to an external hard drive that is uefi(windows 11):** image edited to show what i see

www.dell.com

UEFI BIOS should allow use of mouse interactions, whereas it's predecessor legacy BIOS didn't.
Reference:

UEFI runs in 32bit or 64bit mode, whereas BIOS runs in 16bit mode. So UEFI is able to provide a GUI (navigation with mouse) as opposed to BIOS which allows navigation only using the keyboard.

Source: UEFI vs BIOS | Freecodecamp

So, according to expectation, your mouse or touchpad should work in the UEFI menu. I haven't seen an ability to disable these inputs in UEFI, there again, I haven't seen all UEFI's, so maybe check for this possibility.

abactuon · Aug 4, 2024

Uninstall program from Logitech.
The mouse should work without it.
Wipe the lens with a cloth.
If nothing works, do a clean installation of Windows (to make sure the problem is hardware and not software.).