MS Intellipoint 4.1 suddenly doesn't recognize my Intellimouse Optical

[Goi]

Hi guys,
I have an MS Intellimouse Optical with the Intellipoint 4.1 software/drivers installed. Recently, I noticed that the 2 extra buttons no longer do anything other than click, so I thought maybe the settings are wrong. I went to Control Panel->Mouse and then noticed that the "Connected Device" listbox is empty, with no available options, and all 5 buttons are set as "Click". When I try to manually set the buttons up and/or restore the defaults, the software gives me 2 errors, "You must assign the "Click" command to one, and only one, pointing device button", then "An error occured while Windows was working with the Control Panel file C:\WINNT\System32\main.cpl".

The weird thing is that when I go over to Mouse->Hardware, "Microsoft USB Intellimouse Optical(Intellipoint)" is detected, and "this device is working properly" is stated.

Here's what I tried to no avail:
Rebooted system
Disabled, then enabled mouse
Uninstalled and reinstalled the drivers.
Uninstalled X-Setup, a Windows tweaking program that I've downloaded recently(some of the mouse properties I messed around with might have caused the problem)

btw I'm running Windows 2000 SP3.

*Edit* I forgot to mention that I'm running 2 mice - a MS Intellimouse Optical USB and a Logitech FirstMouse PS/2. They were working together just fine before, and still work together right now, except the Intellipoint software doesn't recognize the Intellimouse Optical, and hence the extra 2 buttons can't be used. I tried plugging out the Logitech mouse and rebooted, sure enough, the Intellipoint software now recognized my Intellimouse Optical. Plugged the Logitech back in and rebooted, same problem again. I really need both mice on my computer, any ideas?

Does anyone know what's going on? Please advise...

Thanks!

 

[HeinekinMan]

It sounds like these features were working before you updated to SP3, so maybe SP3 broke them.

I've updated all 3 of my machines to SP3 and everything seems to be ok...but...SP3 did break a feature that worked perfectly fine in SP2 on all of my machines (I've verified it along with others; relates to USB devices and the registered applications list). I've since discovered a better workaround so I could care less but it definitely tells me that SP3 does have some hidden unwanted side affects (to be expected coming from Microshaft). Did you install SP3 with the rollback option? If so then maybe you could try rolling back to SP2 (if these features are that important to you) to see if it's related to SP3.

MS has already released a couple of pre-SP4 hotfixes to fix what SP3 has broken!!

 

[lung]

I would just get rid of the Intellipoint drivers. In fact, that is what I did. I am running XP Pro with SP1 and recently remembered that after my recent fresh install that I hadn't installed my mouse drivers. So i download and install Intellipoint 4.1. No longer did my side buttons on my Optical Intellimouse work with IE6. So I uninstalled the drivers and they worked again. I really don't see any difference between using the drivers with Windows or using the latest Intellipoint drivers.

 

[Goi]

HeinekinMan, this isn't an issue with SP3, since I've had SP3 longer than I've had both mice(both mice are less than a month old). However, I've just recently installed a fix that *might* be a problem...I'll try rolling that back to see if that's the problem...

lung, without the Intellipoint software, how would you assign the side buttons? I mean, would it default to Back and Forward, or could you assign it? When I was using the default driver, the Intellimouse Optical was simply detected as a "HID compliant mouse" or something, and I don't remember seeing any side button functionality.

Also, would using the default driver perhaps lower the 6000Hz scanrate to a lower one? I dunno...

 

[Goi]

OK, I fixed it by doing a number of things, I don't know which one of them fixed it back. I hope its permanently fixed though.
Here's what I did.
1) Rolled back Q324096: Security Update
That didn't help at first
2) Disabled Intellimouse Optical in Control Panel->Mouse->Hardware->USB Intellimouse Optical
Now only the Logitech's working
3) Uninstalled Intellipoint 4.1 software
4) Rebooted system
Win2K recognizes the mouse as a "HID compliant mouse". Both mice are working, and the side buttons are defaulted to "Back" and "Forward" with no other choice available in the mouse menu.
5) Deleted leftover Intellipoint directory/sub-directories and checked registry for any remnants of Intellimouse/Intellipoint references. There weren't any of major significance.
6) Installed Intellipoint 4.1
7) Rebooted system
Now everything's back to normal. Might have been any one of these steps. Now I don't know whether or not to reinstall the new Pre-SP4 hotfix(Sep 25). I can't see how a FrontPage 2000 extension for MS Office can mess with the mouse software though.