mouse and keyboard not working

[tlclark80]

I am losing my mind. We had a storm last night that knocked out our power. Upon restarting my systems to check everything I noticed hat my mouse and keyboard shuts off before the windows and icons finish loading. What the heck!?!

[Lightninghawk]

Swap them out. If that doesn't work reply back and let me know I'll walk you through checking the BIOS, but if you have a spare mouse or keyboard try that first.

Also unplug the mouse and keyboard. If they are PS2 connections make sure all of the pins are straight. I had a mouse the other day that had never been unplugged at all from the machine and worked fine. Then just stopped, and one of the pins ended up being bent. Don't ask me how it worked before because I can't explain it. Sorry.

[tlclark80]

I did still the same thing

[Chaky]

Are your Keyboard and Mouse USB devices, or PS2?

Might be that USB contoller suffered some damage, or there is some other USB device that might causing problems.

[mathematician]

I am losing my mind. We had a storm last night that knocked out our power. Upon restarting my systems to check everything I noticed hat my mouse and keyboard shuts off before the windows and icons finish loading. What the heck!?!

Can you get into the BIOS? If the keyboard works there, the answer is probably that your operating system needs reinstalling.

[tlclark80]

yes i can get into it. how can i reinstall them if the mouse and keyboard is not working

[Chaky]

Try this... it might help.

Unplugg both mouse and keyboard and boot the machine. Hopefully you don't need password (read: working keyboard) to fully boot the machine.

Once it is booted, hit the power button and the PC wil shut down.

Plug back in mouse and keyboard, power on the machine and hope for the best.

In case they are USB (answer the Q, please), then simple plug-out-and-in would do SOMETHING to plug&play service...

Also, you can hit f8 before Windows logo and boot to safe mode.. from there you can look at the logs in Event Viewer, check the device manager, etc.

[tlclark80]

They are both USB. I will try thst snd let you know. Thanks

[tlclark80]

the plug in play option did not work so i am going to try the safe mode option to see if that will shed some light. I did not think of that one.

[kaninelupus]

OK - try this in case drivers became corrupted during power-outage:
Make sure keyboard and mouse are plugged in
Go to Device Manger (from Control Panel), and uninstall drivers for the correct mouse and keyboard
Unplug devices and re-plug (leave for at least 30 secs before re-plugging to allow Windows to fully recognise devices have been removed)
On re-plugging, Windows should re-install the nesc plug-and-play drivers

Have had this issues a few times over the years, and this generally fixes pronto :)

[tlclark80]

how do I get to the control panel with both the mouse and keyboard not working?

[kaninelupus]

What about the keyboard you are currently typing on, or are you posting via a notebook?

If no spare available, can you borrow one for the task? If not, can usually pick up an el-cheapo for the task... always good to have a back-up for such tasks anyhow.

[tlclark80]

I have two other computers,but of course the problem is on the one i need for work. I tried my wireless one and my extra one i have around the house same thing though

[kaninelupus]

Are any other devices functioning via the USB ports? It may well be the USB ports or port controllers were fried

[tlclark80]

I thought that too, however, they work when i am in bios

[kaninelupus]

Am just wondering if usb drivers (which are native to Windows) have been knocked out.

I do seem to remember there is a way to execute System Restore from boot, which may restore system pre-power outage. Of course, knowing what Windows OS you are running would help :)

Also, are you able to boot in Safe Mode? From memory, Windows loads out backup drivers during Safe Boot, so may be able to use System Restore from there

[mathematician]

yes i can get into it. how can i reinstall them if the mouse and keyboard is not working

Because one of the first things which will happen when you begin reinstallation is that the operating system will load drivers for the mouse and keyboard from the CD. The fact that you can get into the BIOS means that there is nothing wrong with the keyboard hardware, and probably nothing wrong with your mouse.

[tlclark80]

I will try to do the safe mode option first because I am not sure where my cd is. I have xp on my pc.

[mathematician]

I will try to do the safe mode option first because I am not sure where my cd is. I have xp on my pc.

Well if you do try it, it will first of all ask you if you want to try and repair it with "recovery console." The answer to that is probably no, unless you know what you are doing. A little later on it will tell you that it is looking for existing Windows installations. Then it will ask you whether you want to repair the existing installation, or install a new copy of Windows. At that point you tell it that you want to repair the existing installation.

Then it will delete all of the operating system files before reinstalling them, but your data and program files will be left untouched.

[Chaky]

I would leave that as a last resort.
"Repairing" windows isn't any different from reinstalling without formatting the drive. All the installed software lose their registry entries and only way to rectify that is to reinstall all that software and updates.