Mouse Cursor Flickering on Windows 10

Anonymous
2019-08-02T14:10:38+00:00

This is a really annoying problem. 

Two things seem to be happening. First is the mouse cursor is flickering. It's as if it's having an anxiety attack. The flicker can also interfere when trying to click on icons, although most of the clicking feature seem to work okay most of the time.

The second thing I noticed is that down at the bottom of the screen is a big circle that has an arrow in it. This arrow flickers in rhythm with the cursor. 

I have tried every suggestion I can find on the internet, including those from this forum. I've deleted device drivers for both the mouse and video card and the intel driver, changed screen resolution, tried changing mouse settings, tried changing the settings of my video drivers,  I tried changing the performance settings, I changed the boot up settings in my Bios. I tried starting up without my usual start up programs. Nothing stopped the flickering.

I use a USB mouse, so I tried different USB ports. I also tried a wireless mouse. The flicker did not stop in either case. I think it's a problem with the Windows update. I had this problem some months back, but it stopped. Then I updated a few days ago and the mouse flickering started up again.

I did notice that while in my Bios the cursor did not flicker. While in Windows 10, as I am now the mouse cursor does flicker.

Help.

Windows for home | Windows 10 | Performance and system failures

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Anonymous
2019-08-11T14:34:07+00:00

Solved! (I think...)

I spent hours yesterday trying to find the solution to this problem, trying stuff at random and search the internet for ideas. Nothing worked, but I was reading about one person who said his touch pad was causing his flickering problem. I don't have a touch pad, but I do have a touch monitor. In fact I have two monitors, one touch and one is not, which may or may not having anything to do with it.

Anyway, the touch screen monitor was the problem. The first way to solve this, in my situation, was to go to Device Manager > Human Interface Devices > HID-compliant touch screen, right click and disable the device. This worked immediately.

However, as I realized later, the far easier solution is to reach around to the back of the monitor and unplug the usb cord that connects the monitor's touch screen functionalities to the computer. This too caused the flickering mouse cursor to stop. 

Very frustrating problem if you don't know the solution. But when you do it is easy. Hope this helps someone.

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  1. Anonymous
    2019-12-31T04:56:19+00:00

    Thank you Jim! Solved my problem. Disabled the interactive monitor and the flickering went away!

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  2. Anonymous
    2019-12-05T04:16:36+00:00

    Jim -

    Your post helped me figure this out in my own (similar) situation. I was about to reboot (good old remedy) because of the paranoid mouse pointer flicker but then felt that I had too many things open and might lose a lot of that 'state' upon reboot. Upon searching I hit upon this question and your "big circle" observation. I had that as well and realized that there was another faint image of the mouse pointer stuck at the top of my other monitor (as if attempting to break through into the monitor where the mouse was behaving crazy). J ust "undocking" my laptop and "re-docking" it immediately resolved the issue. (As FYI, I have my monitor layout set so that my laptop monitor appears 'below' the larger (docked) monitor...as my laptop is usually resting on a fairly low table for ergonomics of typing on the keyboard while seated.)

    My hunch is that due to some timing issue, the mouse pointer ended up in a split personality mode...may be I was moving it across the monitor boundary just while docking.

    Anyways, thanks for your keen observation. 

    -- Manish

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  3. Anonymous
    2019-10-11T16:42:24+00:00

    Thanks jimclay75051! Issue was touch screen and after disabling the HID-compliant touch screen, the flickering and second cursor disappeared.

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  4. Anonymous
    2019-08-09T13:56:52+00:00

    Well, this problem has returned and it is just as it was before. It was fixed until this morning when I rebooted. I tried giving it a sudden unplug to simulate the electricity going out , but that did not help.

    If you or anyone else has anything else I might try, I will appreciate the help. Thanks.

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