Drag and Drop Not Working in Windows 7

Anonymous
2011-03-18T18:18:13+00:00

I have a new problem that has cropped up just in the last week or two. I can no longer drag and drop my files and folders in Windows Explorer. I have Windows 7 on a HP Notebook. It came installed on the computer last December when I bought it (09). I've never had an issue with it since then, and I'm not sure how to find the settings to enable drag and drop or re-enable it. I know I've done it before on this machine, many times- and just noticed it first in  Thunderbird, (my email desktop application) then in explorer. I did recently install the SP1 (spelling??) a few weeks ago, and have installed a few other odds and ends programs, but I'm pretty sure drag and drop was working okay until a few days ago.

Any help would be appreciated. As a genealogy writer, that's a must have feature.

Thanks.

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Windows update

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Anonymous
2011-07-20T06:47:39+00:00

This happened to me yesterday.

In Windows Explorer, click a file with the left mouse button and keep the button held down. Then press the Escape key. Drag and drop is miraculously re-enabled.

I think just pressing the escape will work too but I'm no longer in a position to test that. I got this from http://it.thelibrarie.com/weblog/2010/06/drag-and-drop-stops-working/

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Anonymous
2014-05-15T11:56:09+00:00

This happened to me yesterday.

In Windows Explorer, click a file with the left mouse button and keep the button held down. Then press the Escape key. Drag and drop is miraculously re-enabled.

I think just pressing the escape will work too but I'm no longer in a position to test that. I got this from http://it.thelibrarie.com/weblog/2010/06/drag-and-drop-stops-working/

I don't feel like reading through everything to see if this has been mentioned.  The escape fix worked for me with Win 7.  The only thing I have that is unique from coworkers is a wireless keyboard and mouse.  I expect that has something to do with my issue.

Thanks Nige!

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187 additional answers

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  1. Anonymous
    2012-06-08T23:31:32+00:00

    I am using Windows 7. I need to drag and drop widgets to sidebars in Wordpress. After I bought a new laptop with Windows 7 installed on it, I found it impossible to perform the drag and drop function (by now a familiar complaint by many Windows 7 users). 

    This never happened with Windows XP. I have tried all the solutions offered by other  users on this forum, but to no avail. I am actually very disappointed that Windows presents a new product which seems unable to adapt to a basic function such as drag and drop. Even more disturbing is that the support service seems to be at sea in trying to assist so many customers with the same problem.

    Hope you will be able to assist.

    Britto

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  2. Anonymous
    2012-06-11T22:53:03+00:00

    Don't know if anyone is still struggling with this but if you are using a Logitech mouse with Logitech Setpoint installed and in Setpoint the option entitled "Enable Smart Move" is selected, it can cause this issue. Just deselect it and it should work.

    At least that worked for me.

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  3. Anonymous
    2012-06-12T03:29:59+00:00

    if some one has noticed that why that problem coming to your mouse. what i have observed, in case you have recently visited a flash based site where your mouse has interacted with the flash component of the site. and you close the window (ie/chrome/firefox), the mouse starts behaving like this. or in other case you have vmware / or some virtualization software installed and you have closed it while the mouse in the focus in the guest. or any other application which is capable of restricting or overriding the mouse behavior causes this problem. solution should be from microsoft to reset and capture back the mouse once the application which has issued the change of the mouse behavior is closed.

    I hope this helps for you people and the devs at Microsoft to generate a hot fix.

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