Office & productivity software forum: Erratic Cursor when using touchpad

Thanks for the Suggestioh Kees but I have two other laptops in the home and I operate them with no problems. Its the Laptop and your right I may have to return it. It runs so well other wise.
Larry

Thanks for the reply Bob. I was telling Kees who responded that I have two other laptops in the home and I work with both of them here and allot on a work Laptop for many years. I have no formal traing for sure and never thought of that. But its something within the computer causing this. Maybe a conflict with some software. Just not sure. I did reload the driver. No help. Send it back I guess. I may give there Technical support one more try.
Thanks Bob Larry

Unfortunately I did not use this brand new laptop much for the past 5 months, BUT now that my old Dell laptop's power supply started shorting out (and I haven't had time to repair it yet) I switched over to "fighting" with Vista and 2007 AND I'm NOT very happy with all the crazy changes!!!! HOWEVER, now the mouse has developed a mind of it's own -- just like I've discovered others have experienced! I'd love to walk into a Dell exec's offcie and put it on his desk to use for the day! Appears there are a lot of other very frustrated Dell owners out there. The time I've spent fusssing with resetting sensitivity, etc. should have been spent repairing the power supply for my "old" Dell -- it's been a work horse, with few issuses I couldn't fix "in the field" It appears that I need to insist that they send a tech out immediately AND NOT mess with them trying to "fix" it over the phone / internet - right? I'm hoping there's been some new developments since earlier post I've found about this problem. Thanks!

I have this same problem with my Inspiron 1525. The touchpad response is erratic. Sometimes it will not respond at all to finger movement. Sometimes it gets stuck 'on' (as indicated by the tray icon) when its not being touched at all. But the biggest problem is with its inconsistent behavior when moving. When moving my finger carefully in a straight line horizontally across the touchpad, the pointer moves vertically in two spots (near the middle of the touchpad). Likewise, when moving my finger carefully in a straight line *vertically* across the touchpad, the pointer moves *horizontally* in two spots (near the middle of the touchpad). Sometimes the pointer moves slowly, and sometimes it nearly leaps across the screen, no matter how I move my finger (as if the sensitivity is completely random).

In a recent online chat with Dell support, they had me upgrade the BIOS on the computer from A11 to A16, but that did not help. They also had me install Notebook System Software (NSS) but that made no difference either. I upgraded the driver to version 7.1.1500.2 but that also did not help. I am convinced this is a hardware issue, perhaps related to ElectroMagnetic Interfence (EMI) (and static electricity or issues with the AC adapters would certainly exacerbate it). For me, the problems exist with or without the AC adapter plugged in. Regardless, my AC adapter is Rev A01.

PROBLEM: I have had the same erratic mouse touchpad issue with my Dell Inspiron 1525. Running Widows Vista with Touchpad driver 7.1.1500.2.

SOLUTION: The touchpad has been working normally since I restored all of its settings to default (including turning the annoying scrolling and double click features back on).

Go into Control Panel > Mouse > Click to change touchpad settings> go into each of the four setting windows and click "Default" button.

Hope it works for you as well.

This worked for me! I don't know if this will work for everyone, but it's definitely worth a shot. The link will explain what to do, but I just shut down my 1525, unplugged it, took the battery out, pushed the power button about 5 or 6 times, and put it back together. And my mouse is good as new! (but with Dell sometimes new isn't even That great! but it works so I won't complain)

Thanks for the link!

I have no idea why it is called "flea power" or if that is just a silly name for static electricity, but this fix WORKED for me, and I am very happy about that.

My mouse pad was erratic, but a plugged in mouse was not fixing the problem, either. My cursor was jumpy, it was clicking on things at random, sometimes even without me touching the computer at all. It had gotten so bad I was trying to look for a new computer--which was hard to do, since the cursor was SO erratic.

There was a brief moment of cursor clarity, and I landed on this thread from four years ago, and even though I have a different brand of laptop, this fix worked. I unplugged the cord, removed the battery, cleared out a bunch of dust (had to note the interesting connection between all that dust and the term flea powder), held the power button down for about ten seconds, then put the battery back in, plugged the power cord back in, and turned on the laptop.

Eureka! A functional cursor. What a blessing. So, yes, I am well-aware that this thread is old. But I wanted to reply for those poor folks, like me, who land here, and wonder if this fix is outdated. Flea power, indeed. Who knew?

Hi guys, I've been having the exact same issue as you all describe, I am using a Toshiba Satellite L300D running Vista.

I tried everything I could think of to resolve this including things mentioned in this thread eg draining the "flea power" but nothing worked. I stumbled upon something suggesting to clean the touchpad using window cleaner, and low and behold ever since *touchwood* the touchpad has been fine no sign of any erratic behaviour at all. I'm kicking myself over it being so simple!

Give it a go guys!

I have a Dell laptop and had the same problem since I changed my power supply. whenever I connected the power supply, touch pad went crazy and couldn't move the on a ramp smoothly. After changing the power supply, the problem was fixed.

This one: http://code.google.com/p/touchfreeze/ ?

It really makes sense to keep a copy of every downloaded program (the setup, I mean), so you can always reinstall it. Just make a folder "Programs I installed and don't want to lose" somewhere (a shorter name is better, this is just to make it clear) and include it in your regular backup.

I assume you know enough to have a backup of your own data (documents, pictures, music, etc). Then this is just a little bit more to backup.

Kees

No, you can't copy the installed program from Program Files.

What I do.
I never run the setup program from the Internet when downloading. I always save it on my hard disk, so it ends up in the download folder. I run it from there. Then I copy the installer to a subfolder intalled_programs I made in Program Files just for the purpose of saving these downloaded programs. And that subfolder is included in my regular backup (together with documents and pictures and mail and address book and favorites, everything I don't want to lose).

So all setup programs are on backup media (first temporarily on a USB-stick, then on the hard disk of a second PC in my home network, and occasionally copied to an external hard disk I save at work). Once this is routine you never lose such a program and if you buy a new PC you have them all handy to reinstall (after checking if there's a more recent version available on the internet).

There are many backup programs available that you setup once by inputting all folders you want to backup and when that's done, all that rests is clicking that shortcut once a week or so. it's routine.
And it should be routine for everybody.
Here's an example (a yesterday post) from somebody who didn't: http://forums.cnet.com/7723-6122_102-587135/is-there-any-way-to-get-my-data-back/?tag=mncol;2f

Kees