[Tfug] Erratic mouse behavior

[Bexley Hall]

Hi, Charles,

> Recently, I've been getting very erratic mouse behavior

What do you mean by "erratic"?
Is it a mechanical mouse (i.e., ball) or "laser"?

> with my 
> Debian/Windows XP OS on K7 motherboard with AMD Athlon
> (ca.2004).  It's 
> driving me crazy.
> 
> On the advice of some news groups.
> 
> I set acpi=off in /grub/menu.lst
> I used variuos "Resolution"s in etc/X11/xorg.conf
> 
> When I boot Windows I pretty much get the same behavior,
> erratic mouse pointer. 

Then doubtful any of your abovementioned changes will
make a difference!  :>

> I changed some ACPI stuff around in BIOS, no difference in
> mouse behavior.
> 
> Is my PS/2 mouse port bad?  Should I reinstall BIOS
> software?  New dual 
> core computers are as low as $300.00.

PS/2 ports seldom "go bad".  Though if you've been abusing
the connector, it may not be making a good contact.
If you also plug/unplug this and/or the keyboard often,
I've seen SMT components adjacent to the connector(s)
work their way loose (reflowing the solder joint fixes this)

Are you having similar "problems" with your (PS/2?) keyboard?
I.e., they share some electronics.

[I also assume this is a *wired* mouse and therefore no issue
with a wireless xmitter, etc. being a culprit]

> Any advice??

Try another mouse.  Or, try that mouse on another machine
(this is, bar far, the easaiest course of action and gives
you the most information for the least effort/expense)