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Honored Contributor
Posts: 24,109
Registered: ‎03-09-2010

My mouse vamoosed for a bit.

In an interesting twist, I went to reboot my computer a while back and it got stuck on the "Preparing Windows, don't shut off your computer" screen. After about half-hour of staring at that, I decided that maybe, just maybe there was something wrong. I then did a hard reset and it came back up and seemed fine with the slight, tiny, teensy little issue of the mouse pointer was gone. I changed out the batteries in my wireless mouse (for the first time in three+ years I might point out, those batteries last forever) and that had no impact. I switched the wireless receiver to a different USB port, but no help. I rebooted the computer again and nothing changed. I broke out my old wired mouse and plugged it in, and nothing.

 

A bit of poking around online on my smartphone gave me no real good answers. Mr. Mouse was no longer in device manager which made updating it kind of tricky. Mr. Mouse had flown the coop. So, what to do, what to do? When all else fails just keep trying to restart it. On the third (or fourth) try Mr. Mouse came back! Yea! Why was it gone? I have no idea. Why did it come back? No idea. I'm just glad it did. It makes using the desktop computer so much easier when the mouse works. 

 

If you find this happening to you, just keep rebooting the computer, and sooner or later the mouse may decide to return. Mine finally did. It took the better part of an hour all told to get it back, but it's back. So, that was fun. Not really how I'd planned to spend my morning, but it's back and working now.

 

Now, this all took place while I was using the computer to charge my new Wyze Smartwatch (pretty nice for a $20 smartwatch by the way,) so there could have been some weird interaction between the two. I'd unplugged the watch when Mr. Mouse finally came back, so my best guess is the computer and the watch had some sort of a conflict. I'm not going to test that theory by reconnecting the two, the watch will get charged elsewhere from now on.

Fly!!! Eagles!!! Fly!!!
Esteemed Contributor
Posts: 7,809
Registered: ‎12-24-2010

Re: My mouse vamoosed for a bit.

One step at a time.  I think sometimes we expect too much from our toys. (overload)    Also think you hit on the reason mouse escaped.

Honored Contributor
Posts: 24,109
Registered: ‎03-09-2010

Re: My mouse vamoosed for a bit.

Yeah, it could have just been a coincidence or it could have been the watch driver interacting with the mouse driver. I'm just glad it's fixed.

Fly!!! Eagles!!! Fly!!!
Honored Contributor
Posts: 18,187
Registered: ‎07-26-2014

Re: My mouse vamoosed for a bit.

Reason why I keep a "wired" mouse as a "backup" for those "just in case" moments.

"Never argue with a fool. Onlookers may not be able to tell the difference."


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Honored Contributor
Posts: 24,109
Registered: ‎03-09-2010

Re: My mouse vamoosed for a bit.


@Mz iMac wrote:

Reason why I keep a "wired" mouse as a "backup" for those "just in case" moments.


I have two wired mouses/mice(?) and it didn't see them either. It was very weird. One old mouse uses the old IBM plug on the back of some motherboards (luckily my motherboard has such a plug) and one uses a USB port, but neither one worked. The computer just said, "I don't care what you do, I'm not letting you use a mouse!" It was very annoying as problems go. 

 

I initially assumed it was the wireless mouse at fault. It was still using the original batteries from three or four years ago and I never turn it off these days. I thought at first the batteries had finally given up. The LED was lit but I changed out the batteries anyway. No good. I then moved the wireless receiver dongle to a few different USB ports on the off chance that was the issue. Nope. One of the spare front USB ports and then one on the motherboard itself in the off chance that the front panel connector had gone screwy. Nope. Then the USB mouse came out and got dusted off and nothing. Then the IBM port mousie got a shot. Nothing again. Device Manager was very consistent in saying there was no mouse no matter what I did. The "Find new hardware" feature of Windows couldn't find my mouse.

 

Google was little to no help. I was getting very annoyed. About then the watch got fully charged and I disconnected it from the computer and put it on my wrist. And miracle of miracles, with the next reboot, Mr. Mousie was back! I'm still not sure if it was the watch causing the trouble or if it was all a big old coinky-dink, but I'm happy the mouse is back and working again. Using a desktop computer without a mouse gets a bit tedious, at best.

 

I fired all of my troubleshooting bullets at the issue and nothing worked, so then you get down to the "Well, let's just keep restarting it and see if it decides to fix itself" method and that worked. Well, that and removing the watch from the system. Windows has some weird "This idiot keeps restarting me, maybe something's wrong. Let's go back to an older setting and see if he stops restarting us" code stashed in there somewhere, so when things go horribly wrong, if you just keep rebooting it, eventually it'll figure it out and try to fix itself. Did I fix it by removing the watch or did it just get tired of me rebooting it and fixed itself? I don't know. I don't care. I'm just happy it's working again.

Fly!!! Eagles!!! Fly!!!
Respected Contributor
Posts: 2,510
Registered: ‎11-08-2020

Re: My mouse vamoosed for a bit.

@gardenman, persistence pays off!  S

Honored Contributor
Posts: 43,249
Registered: ‎01-08-2011

Re: My mouse vamoosed for a bit.

Also be sure the mouse is turned on.