Surface Pro 2017 touchpad mouse freezing

@Aray P , @RichardWeber1, @hamadabdullah

I've noticed this problem on my SP5 just since March, or so, this year.  It's extremely annoying.  I've noticed that it resolves temporarily after removing the typecover, briefly, and reattaching it, which appears to cause something to "reset". Further, I notice that the issue appears largely due to some aggressive process grabbing the FOCUS away from the mouse/touchpad.  For instance, rapidly hitting the ESC key alternating with right-clicking the touchpad often causes the interfering process to give up for a time, thereby restoring the focus to the mouse/touchpad without having to reset these.

Reinstalling the mouse/touchpad drivers doesn't usually resolve this issue, because the issue is not ultimately with these drivers.  Causing the typecover to reset by detaching/reattaching it has the same (temporary) effect as reinstalling these drivers.

I have often noted that the problem recurs as soon as I open a browser (I use Mozilla).  It is particularly common when approximating the pointer to active links or objects in the browser and also occurs when the pointer is directed inside other applications, like Outlook or Word, to menus and buttons. (Thus, not fundamentally a problem with the browser!)

At times, this graphical issue between the pointer and the graphics system causes the entire screen to freeze and, at this point, if listening to an audio stream, will cause the audio system to begin loudly buzzing.  This says to me that the issue is very low-level and represents (at least at this point), a genearlized fault on the system bus.

However, prior to this point, the issue appears localized to some overly agressive process grabbung the focus away from the mouse/touchpad, thereby making it unresponsive.

I'm hoping that having pursued Arap P's method and turning off the auto-page refresh on the screen will cure the issue.

Thanks to everyone who contributed to this initial thread - I think it confirms that MS have a problem, or maybe 'problems' in regards the Surface Pro that they need to put to bed one way or the other.

For my own version of this issue, I seem to have recently come to a conclusion.

The problem of the mouse sticking only ever happened when the unit was plugged into the charger and then, only at work which was 90% of my usage time.

When Covid hit, I became based from home like many others and I realised that the problem was not occurring when plugged in at home.  With that bit of confidence, I invested in an expensive dock to make my work station more workable long term and that has happily worked out well and not turned out to be a wasted purchase.

I have recently started going back to the office for a day a week and low and behold, the problem returned as soon as I plugged my laptop in at the office.  I tried all sorts of different power outlets, extension leads, adaptors and even chargers (as I have two) - nothing stopped the problem.

Last week the local electricity supply Co did some upgrade work to the power to our industrial estate and the problem with my Surface Pro has vanished.  Not just an improvement - the problem has completely gone.

I have to conclude therefore that whilst the only peice of kit to display any issue at all in the office was my Surface, once the local power supply of the building was improved (and I can't get the exact details of what they did albeit it seems some kind of PFC or power conditioning might be involved) it is now behaving perfectly as it should.    This kind of suggests that the Surface Pro is really sensitive to the condition of the power supply and hopefully this gives MS a clue (if they read these and if they don't already know) as to unlocking at least one of the problems with this otherwise great laptop.  I would add, that after returning to the office and experiencing the problem post Covid lockdown, I was ready to give in and buy something completely different

• it was just a happy piece of luck that the local electricity supply was modified.

Hope this might help some of you isolate your own problems with the Surface freeze.  

All the best.

Hey MpDrums1, I think I posted more or less the same answer already 2 years ago.

It has something to do with what I call "dirty power".

I experienced it in a hotel. When I requested a room in a totally wing of the hotel, the problem disappeared.

So yes, it is DEFINITELY power supply related.

Microsoft should know this already for 2 years, but other than my money, they don't give a beep about me, or you.

@MPDrums1 and Arthur TFD:

All very interesting.  I notice that my Surface Pro 5 needs a new battery and cannot maintain a charge.  If the problem resolves once I've been able to update the batter/power supply, I'll let you know.

Not incidentally, Surface 5 and 4 batteries can now be replaced by purchasing the part and installing it, yourself.  These can be found on Amazon, for instance.

They cost about $45.  But execising the technical skill necessary to open the device and replace the battery, that's a bittrickier.