I just got a new computer and I was seeing some discouraging (and odd) behavior. I kept seeing that the mouse would become less and less responsive, and eventually other parts of the machine, even the ability to open something like the start menu, would fall apart. Earlier, my solution was to go into BIOS (spam F12) and do a diagnostic, which all came back fine and then (somehow) left the machine in a useable state. I was also instructed by Dell Support to power-cycle the machine, and indeed to unplug it completely and depress the power button for twenty seconds to help drain any excess capacitance.
Tonight, I think I was able to identify the problem. It cropped up as I was getting later into my “daily” routine, which is to log onto each of my toons parked at the trivia quest in Tanaris at the Bronze Celebration tent. They get a good amount of XP, maybe the buff for the week, and log out. And I do it again on the next alt. I used to multibox, so I have a lot of toons that I can do this with–over 150.
It seems that, as I am getting more and more of them done, the mouse becomes less responsive. The thumb pad refuses to work, or it submits the keystroke half a second to a full second late. The scroll stops working or gets sluggish. The clicks never seem to fail, but the rest was emulating a broken mouse so much that I thought my old Logitech G600 had just seen better days. I switched to my new Razer Naga Trinity, but had the same problems. In both cases, I was using the mouse with the manufacturer’s installed software. But the real culprit seems to be logging in and logging out. I don’t know if it has to happen in rapid succession, but the effect seems to be cumulative over the course of 150+ toons. Furthermore, the effect lingers even after restarting the machine. Only after I unplug the mouse and plug it back in does the problem seem to be resolved, and it may be required to both power-cycle the machine and unplug the mouse.
And, yes, half a dozen of you may now respond that it serves me right, or that the glitch is multiboxing, or whatever. I will be using my toon farm, properly leveled, to farm the X-45 heartbreaker (especially now that the drop rate is so much better), then taking on other “unique” challenges.
It would be great if someone at Blizzard can figure out what it is about the client that may be creating such issues for two distinct gaming mice, but I think I can now reproduce the issue. Happy to test again, or try something else for science, tomorrow when it’s time to push all my alts up another 40-50% of a level.
Edit: The reason I post for a broader audience is actually that there may be a slight (but harder to distinguish) effect for a smaller number of login / logout steps. Until the problem gets severe and one compares clicking buttons on the screen versus unresponsive keys, it feels very much like a network lag issue, but it’s actually the mouse. If gaming mice generally are getting flummoxed at a low level, then this is something that should be tested and root-caused.