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"Semi-Freezes" in Windows 10 Pro

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#1
britechguy

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Hello,

 

         I was one of those who signed up for the Windows Insider program leading up to the general release of Windows 10.  This is on a Dell Inspiron 1720 laptop that had Windows Vista Home Premium (32-bit).  At the end of the preview period the machine has upgraded to Window 10 Pro 32-bit.

 

         I am having a repeated problem that I find very weird.  My mousepad works just fine and when I click on the Win10 Start button or icons in the quick-launch toolbar the start menu appears or the program in question launches, but that's where normal responsiveness ends.  If I select an item from the start menu or try to click on either the window for a program that's started, or a tab on a web browser window if that's one of the programs I get absolutely no response - nada.

 

          At the moment I'm Firefox, File Explorer, and Microsoft Edge - all of which fired right up - but none will respond to the mouse.  This is not a one-time incident and very often shutting down, completely, and restarting results in no change in behavior.

 

          I am wondering if anyone else is encountering anything similar?  This is a very weird behavior and I never even experienced this in the preview builds.  I can't for the life of me figure out what's happening here.

 


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#2
Dashing star

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All the drivers are updated?

 

Did you check it in safe mode? File explorer?

 

For browsing start windows in safe mode with networking and check for mouse activities.


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#3
britechguy

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It's using the same drivers it had been during at least most of the run of the previews.  The mouse driver is still the Dell proprietary one for this particular piece of hardware, not a generic mousepad driver.

 

I have not checked it in safe mode and am not sure what you mean by File Explorer.  As I noted, this is an "all or half" behavior and either everything works normally or I can have mouse control over items in the quick-launch bar, desktop icons, and the start button but once programs are launched and running those don't respond to the mouse.  The same is true in File Explorer, which launches fine but then won't respond to any clicks.  This is also true of the start menu.  On rare occasions plugging in an external mouse has "broken the logjam" but in general the external mouse will behave precisely the same as the mousepad.

 

The mousepad itself is never entirely dead and the mouse pointer is never dead at all.  That's what makes this so bizarre.


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#4
Ztruker

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Definitely try Safe Mode with Networking and even a Clean Boot, see if that makes a difference.
 
Troubleshoot Problem with Clean Boot in Windows 8

Says Windows 8 but is the same for Windows 10.


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#5
Dashing star

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I ask you that in safe mode mouse pointer in file explorer working good?

 

How many user account you have in your pc?


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#6
britechguy

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Updates.

 

1.  When I ask Windows 10 (regular mode) to update the mousepad driver it indicates I have the most current version installed.

 

2.  On the occasions where the machine behaves normally with regard to the mouspad when it boots up it virtually always goes into "I can start programs from the quick launch bar but then can't interact with them" mode after sitting for a few hours.

 

3.  I just booted the machine into Safe Mode with Networking this morning and the crazy mouse behavior is the same whether I'm trying to use the mousepad or plugging in the external mouse.

 

4. When the system is in is whacked-out normal mode even a left click on the desktop constantly brings up the context menu that has "Personalize" at the bottom.

 

5. In whacked-out Safe Mode I can't even get items on the quick launch bar or the start key to react to a mouse click.

 

6. The only way to gracefully shut down once the mouse is no longer functioning is to Ctrl+Alt+Delete, tab my way down to the power button at the lower right, hit Enter to get the shutdown/restart options to show, then arrow to the one I want and hit Enter again.

 

 

When the mouse isn't working the misbehavior is very similar whether in normal mode or Safe Mode with the Safe Mode behavior being slightly worse as far as lack of reaction to clicks on the quick launch/start.

 

At the moment I have two accounts on the laptop though this started when I had only one.  The second account has not been used in any way beyond being set up.  Since the behavior has not changed since that addition I do not believe the two are linked.


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#7
britechguy

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Additional Update:  When trying to set up a clean boot while in Safe Mode my mousepad reactivity died when I transitioned to the Startup tab in the Task Manager step.

 

As an interesting aside, even though I did not check the box saying "keep these startup settings for subsequent startups" (or something close to that in msconfig when setting up for a Safe Mode boot) the machine is keeping them anyway.

 

Why in heaven's name did Microsoft make it so difficult to boot into Safe Mode after Win7?!!   It's not like this isn't a common diagnostic step and is very often done when you simply can't boot into normal mode at all.  It made so much more sense to make this occur via the F8 repeated key press when booting.   The required technique now is just plain stupid and far too complicated.  [I hasten to add that this opinion is not the result of not being able to do the steps necessary, either.]


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#8
britechguy

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Further Update:

 

Clean boot makes absolutely no difference.  I'm getting the same mouse behavior during a clean boot.

 

What's really frustrating at the moment is that since I cannot interact with the radio buttons in msconfig (or at least I haven't found a work around) I'm stuck with clean boot for the moment.

 

It appears that Windows 10 does support an easier way to do a clean boot than was required for Windows 8.  On the General tab of the System Configuration one of the radio button options is Diagnostic Startup (Load basic devices and services only).  This appears to be what the intended result of the gyrations of going to the services tab and disabling anything that's not a Microsoft service and going to the Startup tab and disabling all other startup processes was meant to achieve.  It is a lot easier to just click on the Diagnostic Startup radio button, at least when you can interact with it!!


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#9
Ztruker

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Disable the touchpad in Device Manager, see what that does for you as far as external mouse behavior.


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#10
britechguy

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I'll give that a try, but I'm doubtful it will change a thing.  The system is already set up to disable the mousepad when an external pointing device is plugged in and has been doing so.

 

Even when I boot with a mouse plugged in I get the same behaviors.

 

I've been researching this further and it appears that I'm far from the only person having mouse issues with Windows 10.  Even the Windows Feedback app shows a number of very recent complaints about mouse misbehavior.

 

I just had about 20 minutes of "normal behavior" and then, sans warning, right back to "the usual misbehavior."

 

I've also scanned the system for malware using malwarebytes and, as expected, zero items detected.

 

I just actually uninstalled the mousepad device entirely (which was using Dell Touchpad Driver) and restarted the system.  The OS obviously found a built in pointing device present and has assigned Microsoft's PS/2 compatible mouse driver version 10.0.10240.16384 dated 6/21/2006 to drive the device.  I'm going to see if this fixes any of the issues.  I now have no ability to customize the touchpad behavior, though.


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#11
britechguy

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Well, that's no good, either, now, prior to getting the semi-freeze behavior a few minutes in I've got context menus popping up seemingly at random even when I'm not touching the mouse pad and as the mouse travels.

 

A few minutes after that I've got the same behavior I saw this morning in normal mode with mouse clicks triggering the start button or programs on the quick launch bar but no ability to interact with them.  I can use Alt+Tab to jump between the windows but still cannot interact with them.


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#12
Ztruker

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Wild guess here:

 

Could it be a stuck keyboard key?

 

Power down then invert laptop and rap on the back but not too hard. Maybe something under one of the keys.


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#13
britechguy

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Ztruker,

 

          I don't think so, but I did recently replace the keyboard and am having issues with several keys responding only when in "lower case" mode, they won't produce a character when Shift is pressed.  I have already arranged for a replacement for the replacement to be sent, so will report back after I get it and install it.

 

          I really don't think this is the problem or I should be seeing character repeat streams, and that's never happened.


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#14
britechguy

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Latest update:  Finally managed to replace the keyboard yesterday, which I thought had helped but perhaps not.

 

She ran just fine from last night all the way through this morning when I allowed a restart to apply Windows updates.  Upon reboot I had the same sort of mouse pad behavior I've had in the past.  Another full shut down and restart seems to have resolved this for the moment but we'll see for how long.

 

It is interesting to note that this is a frequent "feature" (I'd say bug) that rears its ugly head after restarts for Windows updates.   It's not exclusive to that situation, but it happens often enough that it hit me this morning that there is a pattern.

 

Technically Dell doesn't "certify" that this machine will run under Windows 10.  It seems that most manufacturers are not "certifying" that any machines older than those originally shipped with one of the Win8 verisons will run under Win10.  Given that this is the case it's pretty striking to me that MS is pushing the upgrade to Win10 on every machine I've worked on that's got Win7 on it.


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#15
tennisboy

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I think I am having the same problem as you. Were you able to find a fix? My computer is freezing and the only thing I can do is move my mouse cursor :(


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