Mouse lag in video games since upgrading to Windows 8.1

Anonymous
2013-10-31T03:24:23+00:00

Since I’ve upgraded to Windows 8.1, when playing some games the mouse doesn’t behave right. It lags, or the pointer jumps back and forth, or I can’t click fast.

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Gaming

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Anonymous
2013-10-31T03:29:40+00:00

Updated (11/8)

We want to thank our gaming community for the detailed feedback many of you have provided on these issues.  We have released some fixes and workarounds that will allow you to get back to your gaming.

The “mouse lag” issue is actually several different issues that could vary based on the game, input methods used, etc.

The three following issues are addressed by a fix we have provided in **KB 2908279**:

  1. Mouse jitters (jumps forward and back) as you move it through a game – This occurs in some games because Windows 8.1 introduced changes to mouse input processing for low latency interaction scenarios and this causes some games to respond differently to mouse input than in previous releases of Windows.
  2. Mouse movement is not to scale even after acceleration is turned off – If you have turned off acceleration to make the distance on the screen match the distance you move the mouse, that may not work correctly anymore.
  3. Measured mouse Polling Rate has a lower reporting frequency than expected – If you have a gaming mouse that has a high frequency, when you test it, you may find it is reporting a lower frequency than you expect. Note: if you previously encountered issues with measuring the polling rate you will need to follow the instructions in **KB 2908279** to ensure that, not only the patch is installed, but also the app used to measure the polling rate has an appropriate registry entry to enable the fix for that specific executable.

We have also included workarounds here for the following issues:

  1. Mouse may not be able to reach all areas of the game window – This may occur with games that do not use DirectX, when run in window mode. See **KB 2907016** for the workaround.
  2. Can’t left-click with an integrated pointing device immediately after pressing a key – This is a setting for touchpads, like those used on laptops, to make typing easier. You can work around this by changing the mouse delay to zero, but this may make typing more difficult. For instructions to change the setting, see **KB 2907018**.

Some users have also reported success in older games and apps by turning on compatibility mode. To try that:

  1. Right-click the game’s icon.
  2. Select Properties.
  3. Select the Compatibility tab.
  4. Select the version of Windows for which you want to run the game in compatibility mode.
  5. If you want to apply the settings for that program to all accounts on the PC, click Change settings for all users. You might be asked for an administrator password or to confirm your choice.
  6. When you're done, tap click OK.

When we have more information from our investigations, we will update this post. Thank you very much for your patience.

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  1. Anonymous
    2016-12-20T19:41:53+00:00

    I'm beginning to think people are talking about two different things. 

    1.  Mouse lag:  moving mouse and cursor doesn't move at same rate.

              I'm to understand from Microsoft that they created something for HD monitors that's started causing this problem.  Somehow turning this feature off in the game or in the graphics card will fix the problem but cant find it!!!

    2.  FPS lag:  pictures skip and jump and lock up during game. 

             This is a problem with the graphics card not keeping up with the inputs from the processor which may        be caused by processing all the colors and textures or too many programs running in the background and many other possibilities!

    If your picture continues along fine and you see people running around fine without jumping or locking up but your mouse skips all over the place or locks up it is mouse lag not FPS!

    This is the way I understand the problems!

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  2. Anonymous
    2016-11-20T03:54:38+00:00

    try this site. it helped me imensly!!! https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2907016

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  3. Anonymous
    2016-11-11T20:53:31+00:00

    I had a USB Logitech mouse and now a Microsoft wireless mouse and I have the  lag problem also.  it starts out working fine and as long as i'm out of the game it works but when I go into the game it starts slowing down until its just jumping when I move the mouse and sometimes with a 10 second delay.  I am currently running windows 8.1 but had same problem with windows 8.0.  Using keyboard controls there isn't any delay.  After the game delay problem starts I go back online looking up information for the game like recipes and I still have the lag!!  Also like on this page I get a lot of bounce in the screen. Never more that a few times but its irritating!

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  4. Anonymous
    2015-09-16T12:16:23+00:00

    Hi,

    I  am happy to see that the basic mouse partly solved your issue.

    I was using a Razer gaming mouse. I had simply stoped playing any games showing the mouse jump issue. But I have recently reinstall them on the sole purpose of testing the mouse jump issue again.

    I was not able to get the mouse jump issue anymore. I am using Windows 8.1 and did nothing specifically in order to fix the bug except that windows and the razer mouse driver and the games are up to date.

    I understood that some people are still having this issue on the recently released Windows 10.

    If updating windows and the mouse driver and the application does not fix the problem then I suppose that the best solution might be to switch to a basic mouse controller or, if possible, switch to a similar application that would not show bug.

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