Optical Mice

Okay...this falls under the category of "slightly annoying"...but I am trying to figure out if it is an XP issue or an optical mouse issue.  At work, I have XP and a dual monitor setup, with an optical mouse.  At home, I have XP and one monitor, and again, an optical mouse.  Every so often, on both systems (different brands of mice), the cursor jumps across the screen without the mouse being moved.  Sometimes this occurs during a file save, other times during a paste operation, other times not.  I've had it jump from the right monitor to the left one at work, with no real good explanation as to why.  I don't have any strange mouse settings, and I try to keep the sensors as dust free as possible.

Just wondering if anybody else noticed this...

Nope, never noticed that.  I have seen a slow drift when used on something like carpet though

Stephen

I have the same setup, never had this problem. What surface is the mouse on?.


I do have a similar weird issue when using the trackpoint of my notebook, where the pointer just starts to go up to the top of the lcd, when I try to pull it down it just goes back up again, I have this with two of my notebooks, Compaq and Dell.

Surfaces...at home it is an "optical mousepad" (or so the packaging read when I bought it) and at work I have tried using a mousepad, and other times I use the adjustable, metallic keyboard tray which can slide back under the desk.  HR calls the keyboard tray "Stella" (don't ask). But "Stella" has room for a mouse and mousepad on it.

It happens about once a day, sometimes twice.  No particular reason either...and often times the mouse is completely still when it occurs.  I thought that maybe it was a chip/hardware issue with the mouse itself at first, and before at work I had a older, trackball type mouse that did some odd jumps, too, but I kind of expected it due to its age.  At work, it is an IBM Intellistation PC, at home it is a Compaq Presario.

Maybe its some software thats installed on both machines.
Also check if it's happening when other people use your computer, it's possible that you give out some kind of electromagnetic radiation that interferes with your mouse. (just kidding)

Sunspots, of course!

billh wrote:

Okay...this falls under the category of "slightly annoying"...but I am trying to figure out if it is an XP issue or an optical mouse issue.  At work, I have XP and a dual monitor setup, with an optical mouse.  At home, I have XP and one monitor, and again, an optical mouse.  Every so often, on both systems (different brands of mice), the cursor jumps across the screen without the mouse being moved.  Sometimes this occurs during a file save, other times during a paste operation, other times not.  I've had it jump from the right monitor to the left one at work, with no real good explanation as to why.  I don't have any strange mouse settings, and I try to keep the sensors as dust free as possible.

Just wondering if anybody else noticed this...

Mine does, only when I used the wheel, though.

Steve.

Hi.
I used to get the same problem too, that was with my basic wired optical MSFT mouse. It would also shake violently on the screen for no reason, even when using a mousemat.
I've since upgraded to a nice wireless version of the Explorer 2.0 series of MSFT mice, and the problem's gone. I don't even use a mousepad anymore and it works fine on my woodgrain effect desk.
I also noticed that I needed a mousepad with the older mouse, whereas this one works fine without a mousepad.
I have a feeling that it's got something to do with the build of the whole LED mechanism that is used.
My suggestion would be to see if you can get your hands on a higher quality mouse and see if the problem is the same.
Just my two cents
 Shafiq.

I am pulling the 'facts' completely out of my memory, but I had this problem as well waaaaaaay back even with the first optical mice.  Turns out that the mouse positional counter (not a real term, but whatever) has a bit size smaller than the possible values.  What happens is that if you move in the right way, you overflow the value to a negative.  If you keep increasing an unsigned int and then try to typecast it as a signed int, there is a point where it goes from <really big number> to <really big negative number>.

On my really, really old machine (HL1 days) this would cause my point of view to look to the ceiling and spin like a raver on crack.  I think (guess) that XP has a better way to handle this and so I don't ever see it anymore.

The question is...does the cursor move down and to the right?  If so, then this is the same symptom that I experienced. 

This doesn't solve the problem, though, so good luck on that...