Trackball mouse pointer freezes

[wonder]

I have a Kensington Expert Mouse (trackball).

Every few seconds or so the mouse pointer will freeze and not respond to input. The keyboard will work but the mouse pointer freezes. I'll roll the ball and nothing happens.

Sometimes I have to press the spacebar or something on the keyboard and maybe that get's it back up and running. It's pretty annoying especially when working fast.

It's plugged in USB to my keyboard and I've tried different keyboards and still the same thing.

Anyone have this issue or know possibly what it is?

[mikehalloran]

What OS?

Is Bluetooth on? If yes, what are you using for the Bluetooth receiver for your Mac - built-in or 3rd party? Are there other Bluetooth input devices nearby?

What are you using for Time Machine?

Believe it or not, the answers to some questions will affect the correct answers to others.

[williemyers]

I have a Kensington Expert Mouse (trackball).

Every few seconds or so the mouse pointer will freeze and not respond to input. The keyboard will work but the mouse pointer freezes. I'll roll the ball and nothing happens.

Sometimes I have to press the spacebar or something on the keyboard and maybe that get's it back up and running. It's pretty annoying especially when working fast.

It's plugged in USB to my keyboard and I've tried different keyboards and still the same thing.

Anyone have this issue or know possibly what it is?

wonder, as a really old t-ball vet (17+ years), I'll offer the following possibility?
it may be dirty (dusty) inside the ball's cavity! this will happen from time to time will exhibit the exact symptoms you've mentioned.
good news is, easy to fix; flip the whole unit over on it's back so that the ball falls in to the palm of your other hand. set the ball aside and look down in to the cavity. clean out any dust-bunnies that have built up around the 3 resting points of the ball. check for other dust-bunnies.
when done, drop the ball back in a and give it a try?

[wonder]

What OS?

Is Bluetooth on? If yes, what are you using for the Bluetooth receiver for your Mac - built-in or 3rd party? Are there other Bluetooth input devices nearby?

What are you using for Time Machine?

Believe it or not, the answers to some questions will affect the correct answers to others.

OS: 10.6.8
Bluetooth: Off (mouse is USB)
Time Machine: I've had this issue since before I started using time machine which was just in the last month. This mouse issue has been for almost a year or more. But I use a USB 1TB external toshiba drive.


Re: cleaning. I've douched that thing and it still glitches.

[Shooshie]

Are you using Mavericks? If so, there are serious issues with mice and trackpads. Especially the scrolling, but not limited to that. Sometimes the pointer freezes up. Sometimes it disappears entirely — usually during a video or something that makes the pointer go away, and then it won't come back. The temp workaround for that is to move to the top left corner, which is not hard to do when you can't see the pointer, and click the Apple Menu. Suddenly it comes back... unless it's frozen AND invisible. That happens, too, but like one time out of 40 or 50.

Scrolling can be an issue. It freezes up entirely or hesitates. Scrolling next and back, for browser pages or folders in the Finder, can freeze up. When that happens, I just have to log out and log back in. Sometimes it requires a force-quit and reboot.

Some say that when you restart your mac, if you'll NOT check the box to reboot all the apps that were present before you restarted, it fixes these problems. I do seem to experience fewer of them when I do that, but eventually it comes back, no matter what I do.

There are many untested "fixes" in the Apple forums, but they are not really fixes, but advice to clean out all your old logs, zap your PRAM, run a bizarre Terminal script, log out and log in, delete preferences, repair permissions and so forth. They're the fixes you hear for everything, no matter how big or small, simply because they are the few things that some people know. When you only have a hammer, all problems look like a nail. Of course, most of their advised fixes end with "then restart your computer." Well, restarting your computer "fixes" it for the same length of time as any of these faux fixes, so if you want temporary relief, just restart your computer. Don't waste your time (and possibly cause other problems) with these ignorant advisors' ill-advised (but authoritative sounding) errands.

So, if you are in Mavericks, and if you are seeing scrolling and mouse issues, restarting your computer gives you a few minutes to a few hours of relief. Soon, you'll hit one of the triggers, though (you can't avoid it), and the problems all start up again. The fix will have to come from Apple, and believe me, they've heard about it. Their forums are full of complaints about this.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad (or irrelevant, if you're not in Mavericks) news. This is an Apple bug. We can only hope that they will act soon.

Shooshie

[edit] PS: I just saw that you're in 10.6.8. Sorry for the long post about the Mavericks mouse/scroll bug. I'll leave it for others, but I hope you find an answer to your problem. [/edit]

[Shooshie]

Ok, now that I've reread the thread, I think you probably have a dirty device. INSIDE it. I used the Kensington trackballs since the first one was made, around 1985. I used them exclusively until the Apple Magic Trackpad (which finally made me put all my Kensington trackballs and the ones I use for spare parts in the closet — it's that good when you give it a chance), but prior to that, I was an expert on changing out components, cleaning them, and getting recalcitrant trackballs running again.

You have to take the trackball apart with a screwdriver. It seems like there are 4 corner screws, and a couple more in the trackball well. They all have to come out. Remember how the cords are routed around the posts of the structures that support the electronics and moving parts. And be careful not to lose the little idler wheel that helps support the ball.

The moving parts are just bearings -- pretty much like the ones you find in inline skates, but with a special corrugated shield on the side which reflects light intermittently into a set of prisms and detectors. The actual ball and those bearings are the only mechanical parts. Once the LED laser signal is in the detectors, it's electronic from there on out.

So, the problem comes with dust that collects through the holes where the bearings poke through. While dust can build up around the bearings themselves, and should be removed, that's not the only problem. Dust gets BETWEEN the bearing and the LED light source, or between the bearing and the prism/detector, which blocks the path of the light. When that happens, just getting the dust off the bearing isn't enough. You've literally got to go in there and blow it out. Be careful blowing out dust. There's a LOT of it all over the inside of that thing, and it'll get all over you and your desk. But if you take it outside, be sure the moving parts are accounted for! Do it in a box. That seems to work.

I've also had to replace components. Hopefully you won't have to do that, but if you do, get a lightly used one off of eBay and either use THAT, or if you don't want to use it, then use its parts to replace yours.

When putting it back together, back the screws up until you feel a slight "click" which means the threads are in-line with those in the hole, so that you don't strip out anything. Your trackball will survive any number of such cleanings if you are careful in this way.

I remember a problem with one version of OSX (maybe the version you're using) in which the first movement of the trackball would be in the opposite direction of what you want when it's along the axis of one of the bearings. The first reflected signal would simply be interpreted wrong. Then it would go the right way. This may have contributed to worse problems at times, but I don't remember. That was a long time ago. I do remember that it got better when I upgraded to a new version of OSX, but again, I don't remember which one or when.

I can tell you, though, that I was getting desperate for a good, working replacement for my wireless Kensington Expert Mouse Pro and Turbo Mouse Pro (same device, different colors), because of all their buttons, which I used a lot. Things just didn't work right all the time, and I was getting tired of constantly working on my Kensington Wireless Trackball. I tried MANY others and many brands, but did not find one I liked. Finally I tried the Apple Magic Trackpad, which had no moving parts. I loved it. Gave it a month to learn it without abandoning it. I've been hooked ever since. It's got to have JiTouch or Better Touch Tool (3rd party apps) to give it all the gestures you want it to use, and to make them customizable per app. But I now have hundreds of gestures (counting repeats that I use in different apps for different things), and my hands talk to my apps in a sort of sign language that I am almost unaware of. I'd never go back. EVER. Thus my frustration in Mavericks, where scrolling stops working. Fortunately, other gestures keep working. And JiTouch is not part of the problem. I have removed it, and the problem still occurred.

So, there ya go. Fix your amazing and wonderful Kensington Expert Mouse Trackball, and take care of it until you finally get the courage to switch altogether to a new way of doing things — that never needs fixing! (er... until Apple breaks things, but that isn't ours to fix) Then get a Magic Trackpad. The Magic Mouse is interesting, but simply crippled compared to the Trackpad when it comes to customization. I really recommend the Magic Trackpad when you're ready to go that route. Give it a month or two with your Kensington devices in the closet. Force yourself to learn the gestures. (duh! it's easy) Use a wrist pad to raise your wrist up and take the weight of your arm. I think that once you get used to it, you'll never want to go back.

Best of luck!

Shooshie

[James Steele]

Moved to General Macintosh forum instead of DP Troubleshooting.

[mikehalloran]

The reason I asked about Bluetooth is that I had that issue on my wife's computer. It took three AppleCare techs before someone figured out that it had paired with a neighbor's Bluetooth mouse and that was the problem. Turning BT off fixed it.

I have used Kensington trackballs for years and regular cleaning works wonders. Dust on the optical sensor could easily be the problem.