Mark Young

I just got a new computer: AMD 1700+, Gigabyte motherboard with KT266a chipset, Windows XP. The problem is that USB mice do not work properly. Both mice that I tried (Logitech) work just fine on my old computer but on the new computer cursor movement is very jerky as if the sampling or refresh rate is very slow. Device Manager says that everything is okay and the latest drivers are loaded. The shop that built the computer tells me that there is a compatibility problem between the KT266a chipset and Windows XP that causes USB problems. They also say that a fix is imminent and to use the mouse with the PS/2 port in the meantime. The mouse works with the PS/2 port but it does not have the 800 dpi resolution that it would have using a USB port. I have been unable to find out anything about this problem. This makes me suspicious. I would have expected that lots of other people would have experienced it. Does anybody out there have any advice or suggestions?

No, the BIOS was loaded on the floppy. Apparently, "something else" was wrong.

Actually, I tried both Win 98 and ME boot disks, but neither of them worked. Thanks for the tip that internet BIOS flashing is unreliable. Hopefully I won't have to do it again anytime soon.

I finally determined that the problem was with the BIOS. (It had nothing to do with the particular USB port the mouse was connected to). Up[censored] the BIOS turned out to be more complicated than you would think. Normally you would create an MS-DOS bootdisk, load the BIOS onto it, reboot and proceed from there. However, creating a boot disk for XP for this sort of task is quite troublesome. I never did find a satisfactory bootdisk although I had a lot advice from knowledgable people. Fortunately, the CD-ROM that came with the motherboard (GigaByte) had a utility for upgrading BIOS that operated in Windows. It automatically detected the type of motherboard, downloaded the correct BIOS update through the internet, and installed it. Sweet.