If you are anything like me, then typing on your laptop is not always a pleasant experience. One problem is caused by the touchpad. Unfortunately when I type articles, emails, letters, etc., it seem like I am always tapping the touchpad and relocating the cursor. This relocation seem to always be in the midst of another sentence. If you have an external mouse that can be connected to a usb port you can avoid this problem by disabling the the touchpad while you are typing your next great novel or the next big money making how-to article. Listed below are the steps you would need to disable the touchpad under Windows 7.

Click on the Windows 7 icon in the lower left-hand corner. This will bring up the start menu. On the right side of the list of options click on the ‘Control Panel’. This will cause the ‘Control Panel’ box to popup.

In the upper right hand corner you will ‘Search’ input box. In that box type ‘mouse’. You will see a list of ‘Mouse’ options. Click on any Mouse option and it will bring up the Mouse Properties box.

Click on the ‘Device Settings” tab and under Devices, highlight your Touchpad and then click on the Disable button (Enable if you are trying to reactivate the touchpad) or check the box [Disable internal pointing device when external USB pointing device is attached].

At the bottom of the Mouse Properties box, click on and then

Your touchpad will now be either completely disabled or disabled as long as the is a pointing device connected to the USB port. This would depend on the option you selected.

You can reverse this by following steps 1-2 and in step 3 select Enable or uncheck the box, depending on the option used to disable the touchpad. Then continue on to step 4.

Note: If you Mouse properties does not seem to match the description above then make sure the touchpad driver has been installed.

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