Mousy Trails, To You
Until…we boot…again!
One of the most annoying issues I’ve seen with Vista has been The Incredible Case of The Disappearing Pointer.
After my machine has sat idle for any decent length of time not displaying the prinary desktop in lieu of something else, such as…
- Screen saver
- Login screen
- Display auto-powering off
Upon resuming normal activity, I’ll usually end up with a Phantom Pointer. Oh, the pointer is still there, and can be moved over buttons and windows which gladly highlight in Vista on mouseover like they should. But the pointer just isn’t shown. Which is utterly useless and totally annoying, since it normally took a full reboot to display properly again.
It’s even more pronounced with dual displays. When I was using both the internal display on my laptop and a secondary monitor to extend my desktop, oftentimes I’d see that, upon resuming, the pointer wouldn’t appear on one of the displays at all, but would appear perfectly on the other.
I’ve heard tell it’s the crappy nVidia drivers for Vista. Which have been, admittedly…weak all across the board, to say the least.
Here’s a perma-fix if your pointer keeps checking out.
Start->Control Panel->Mouse
Pointer Options tab
Visibility Section
Enable Display pointer trails
Unless you want to see streamers of pointers, set the length/size to Short.
Keep smilin’…un…til then!
