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Please let me know if this is personal blog or doesn't belong here on Dakka.

Lately, I've been having problems trying to move the mouse on my PC. Here are the specs that I know of.

Dell Latitude E6320 Laptop (age is 4-5 years old, I think)
Runs Windows 10 Pro (Upgraded from Windows 7 pro in October 2015)
4 GB RAM at 1333 MHz
250 GB Hard Disk Drive

It has a problem with its battery (it must be plugged in all the time to work)

I use Microsoft Edge to browse, but sometimes the mouse freezes and I have to press either Ctrl or Alt to get it moving again. So far, that's only happening in Edge. In fact, one time this weekend, the mouse froze, and I had to power the computer off to get it to move again. However, there has been no other problems (except for the fact that sometimes, it is slow and doesn't load file explorer or Devices and Printers.) I have not have had any Blue Screens of Death, critical system errors, or anything else that suggests a hardware issue (except for the mouse trouble and battery).

So, is this a sign of hard drive failure? Or what?

Could be the mouse drivers are failing. Maybe check those.

Hard drive failures are very big and sudden things. They rarely if fail slowly over time like that.

I'd do a fresh install of your OS and format.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Could be the mouse drivers are failing. Maybe check those.

Or clean the gunk out of your mouse?

 Breotan wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Could be the mouse drivers are failing. Maybe check those.

Or clean the gunk out of your mouse?

I got the impression, since its a laptop, that its the in-built mouse and not an external one.

Sounds more like an OS corruption than a harddrive issue.

Or a dead/dirty mouse. I’ve had issues where my computer would lose connection to the mouse, and sometimes would find it, other times I’d have to kick it a bit. Just got a new USB mouse, problems went away.

Grey Templar wrote:Could be the mouse drivers are failing. Maybe check those.

Grey Templar wrote:

 Breotan wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Could be the mouse drivers are failing. Maybe check those.

Or clean the gunk out of your mouse?

I got the impression, since its a laptop, that its the in-built mouse and not an external one.

It's an internal mouse.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

curran12 wrote:Hard drive failures are very big and sudden things. They rarely if fail slowly over time like that.

I'd do a fresh install of your OS and format.

I get the fresh install of OS, but what do you mean by format? Does that mean a clean install?

Grey Templar wrote:Could be the mouse drivers are failing. Maybe check those.

It could be that the hardware for the internal mouse hardware is failing. Try using an external mouse (serial or usb) and see if the problem still reproduces.

 Breotan wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:Could be the mouse drivers are failing. Maybe check those.

It could be that the hardware for the internal mouse hardware is failing. Try using an external mouse (serial or usb) and see if the problem still reproduces.

I'll try that.

If it fails, you should destroy the computer in a fiery inferno. It's the only way to be sure.

I don't have the time to look at this right now, but if its a Dell system then here's some troubleshooting spam:

Run the pre-boot diagnostics on the system - done by powering the machine on and tapping the F12 key repeatedly, then choosing diagnostics.

Check in the BIOS for:
- Under General / System information - what is the HDD status (about two thirds of the way down the components list)
- Confirm the BIOS is up to date
- Check if there's any relevant event logs

Sounds like a software error. Check the process in task manager that its not hanging. According to the support site for that product its not tested with Windows 10, so there's no compatibility files for the OS. All I see are the Win 8 files, which yes, if you need drivers you could try installing those (we were using the 8.1 drivers as a stopgap a few months back till the 10 ones came out).

Oh, and FYI, HDD failures aren't an on off thing. You can be having issues for ages before the thing actually fails. This however is coming across as a compatibility issue.

Re: Mouse
- Go here and stick in your service tag. If you're running Windows 10 then use the 8.1 drivers. Download: Bios Update/ Chipset/ Mouse drivers (not massively recommended as if you're running 10 Windows may have pulled newer *generic* drivers)

- go to device manager and delete the mouse drivers/ restart your system - it'll pull the up to date drivers that way

- try in safe mode with networking - at startup spam F8

- try in the BIOS - F2 at statup - does the issue happen? If so then its a hardware/ BIOS fault. If not then its software.

- try an external mouse - if fails then software/ if works then possible touchpad failure

- When the mouse hangs does the whole system hang or just the mouse? I.e. do youtube videos hang. If everything does then troubleshoot as per Memory/ HDD fault

Re: battery troubleshooting:

Run the pre-boot diagnostics

In the BIOS - two things:
- There's a battery status tab - which tells you the battery health and whether or not the system is charging it
- The event logs can hold pertinent errors as well

It's probably not a hard drive problem, your computer will likely "let you know" if it is having trouble reading your hard dive.

What you can do, since it is an old computer, is look at your mouse drivers, and set the software to run in compatibility mode (compatible with whatever OS it came with). You can also set the the computer up so that you can control the cursor with the arrow keys (look in the accessibility settings), which might be useful if your mouse freezes, and help you to isolate the problem.

I had a laptop which had a failed battery and needed to be plugged in all the time.


It turned out the battery had melted and had burned the motherboard to a crisp. But that is just my luck. So it's probably just the mouse driver.

 welshhoppo wrote:
I had a laptop which had a failed battery and needed to be plugged in all the time.


It turned out the battery had melted and had burned the motherboard to a crisp. But that is just my luck. So it's probably just the mouse driver.

Dell system's have multiple in built diags for batteries. If the battery's not charging it can be one of a few things - the battery's gone/ the charger's not of the right wattage/ the connector on the motherboard's faulty/ the BIOS hasn't been set to charge the battery, etc.

Dell batteries are covered for a year period. After that they're out of warranty. That's not to speak of the lifetime they're expected, but if the machine's 5 years old its not unlikely.

 Wyrmalla wrote:
I don't have the time to look at this right now, but if its a Dell system then here's some troubleshooting spam:

Run the pre-boot diagnostics on the system - done by powering the machine on and tapping the F12 key repeatedly, then choosing diagnostics.

Check in the BIOS for:
- Under General / System information - what is the HDD status (about two thirds of the way down the components list)
- Confirm the BIOS is up to date
- Check if there's any relevant event logs

Sounds like a software error. Check the process in task manager that its not hanging. According to the support site for that product its not tested with Windows 10, so there's no compatibility files for the OS. All I see are the Win 8 files, which yes, if you need drivers you could try installing those (we were using the 8.1 drivers as a stopgap a few months back till the 10 ones came out).

Oh, and FYI, HDD failures aren't an on off thing. You can be having issues for ages before the thing actually fails. This however is coming across as a compatibility issue.

Re: Mouse
- Go here and stick in your service tag. If you're running Windows 10 then use the 8.1 drivers. Download: Bios Update/ Chipset/ Mouse drivers (not massively recommended as if you're running 10 Windows may have pulled newer *generic* drivers)

- go to device manager and delete the mouse drivers/ restart your system - it'll pull the up to date drivers that way

- try in safe mode with networking - at startup spam F8

- try in the BIOS - F2 at statup - does the issue happen? If so then its a hardware/ BIOS fault. If not then its software.

- try an external mouse - if fails then software/ if works then possible touchpad failure

- When the mouse hangs does the whole system hang or just the mouse? I.e. do youtube videos hang. If everything does then troubleshoot as per Memory/ HDD fault

Re: battery troubleshooting:

Run the pre-boot diagnostics

In the BIOS - two things:
- There's a battery status tab - which tells you the battery health and whether or not the system is charging it
- The event logs can hold pertinent errors as well

I'm not worried about the battery at all. I still have not tried an external mouse, but I will the first chance I get.

It is also worth noting that the mouse only freezes when the system has been on for a while (more than an hour)

And when the mouse freezes, the rest of the system is fine (it does not hang)

If you want the short way of determining the fault, then stick in an external mouse when it happens. If it has an issue then its software. If it doesn't then its hardware.

An external mouse'll work off the chipset drivers, but it still uses the base drivers which the touchpad works off of.

Per recommendation I tried an external USB mouse, and the problem's gone. I think the trackpad has died, but I'll reboot later and see if it comes back.

Ah, then if the trackpad's gone you may need to replace the palmrest. I'm not at work to check the specs, but IIRC its just a straight cable from the Motherboard on that one to the Palmrest. However, try at least reseating the cable, as that can cause connectivity issues.

Oh, and again. If its an intermittent fault then that's difficult to test. However if the external's working, but the internal isn't that indicates a hardware fault. Software issues don't tend to be so intermittent.

Go into the BIOS and confirm the fault exists there, if need be leave it a while to test. If the fault occurs at a BIOS level then its likely hardware. You can try updating the BIOS, but this isn't really a BIOS type error from my own experience. =/

Drivers. There's BIOS versions A07 to A19 in there. If you're on anything less than A19 then I'd recommend you update that regardless (though if you're jumping more than a handful of versions do so in increments. It doesn't always matter, but recovering a corrupted BIOS can be a pain).

Heh, a week off work and I'm still doing tech support for Dell.

 Wyrmalla wrote:
Ah, then if the trackpad's gone you may need to replace the palmrest. I'm not at work to check the specs, but IIRC its just a straight cable from the Motherboard on that one to the Palmrest. However, try at least reseating the cable, as that can cause connectivity issues.

Oh, and again. If its an intermittent fault then that's difficult to test. However if the external's working, but the internal isn't that indicates a hardware fault. Software issues don't tend to be so intermittent.

Go into the BIOS and confirm the fault exists there, if need be leave it a while to test. If the fault occurs at a BIOS level then its likely hardware. You can try updating the BIOS, but this isn't really a BIOS type error from my own experience. =/

Drivers. There's BIOS versions A07 to A19 in there. If you're on anything less than A19 then I'd recommend you update that regardless (though if you're jumping more than a handful of versions do so in increments. It doesn't always matter, but recovering a corrupted BIOS can be a pain).

Heh, a week off work and I'm still doing tech support for Dell.

The trackpad is okay now. I rebooted, and it was fine.