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mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Thomas Maude
Calling all help !

Ive upgraded to mavericks from 10.7.5 using the migration assistant provided and downloaded and installed mavericks without any problems, I am now running mavericks with all the extras working perfectly. There is only one major problem which I will now try to outline as simply as I can.

When the new system was started up thick black rectangle appeared surrounding my cursor and it surrounds the pointer wherever I move it. I had been using a Logitech G400 mouse which is officially classed as a gaming mouse, I had chosen this as it was the closest thing to the mouse I had used for ten years the logitech G300 which had been superseded but he G400. When I started to use the G400 about three years ago it wasn't supported by mac so I used something called Steermouse http://plentycom.jp/en/steermouse/index.html

This app allowed me at the time to use the G400 and set the buttons up on it for general use on the mac and not for any gaming which I don't do at all. And that for the last three years has been working perfectly until I upgraded to Mavericks. Here is what I have tried to get rid of it so far.

Ive uninstalled steer mouse and uninstalled the soft wear connected with the Logitech G400 ...rebooted done the fix disk permissions ..rebooted ...etc I am now using the original mac mouse that came with the computer ( 2Ghz intel core duo late 2007) which when I go to systems preferences shows up as the only mouse supported and the custom options work and relate to this mac mouse.

I had been thinking that there maybe some residual stuff left over from the old G400 or steer mouse soft wear that I had uninstalled so I used one of my three eternal hard drives I had backed up my 10.7.5 system to before I installed Mavericks on the hard drive.

I removed and uninstalled all the above soft wear from the external back up before I installed Mavericks over it .......again downloaded and installed without any problems till I once again saw my nemesis appear the thick black rectangle around the cursor.

I'm getting a little concerned now as I thought I could rectify this but I am running out of Idea's ....lastly I have done a safe boot and before I restart the computer there is no rectangle there when I restart then it appears when the system starts to run.

Incidentally when I chose to run my back up and bootable external disk in 10.7.5 there was no rectangle when I ran it.

A bit of a conundrum for sure ..sorry it has been a bit long winded but the rectangle is a real pain and making using the computer very irritating to say the least. The rectangle is apron 6cm X 4cm and is dragged around with the curser locked inside it.

Any helpful suggestions would be welcome

Many Thanks in advance ...yours desperately

Tom

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Mick Burrell
It sounds to me as if something from Steer Mouse or Logitech is not sitting happily with Mavericks so my first suggestion is to go to those web sites and see if a Mavericks update is available or in the pipeline. If not then my second suggestion would be that one or both applications have something left behind after your uninstall.

You don't say how you uninstalled. Did you use an uninstall utility that came with the software or just drag to the trash? Or did you use a general uninstall utility? If not the former then I suspect that something has been left behind. You could check even if you did use the supplied uninstaller. In system preferences under users, make sure nothing connected to this mouse has been set to run at startup. If it has, delete it. If it hasn't, look inside your user library folder and then in Application Support and Preferences for anything bearing the name of the company or the device and drag to your desktop. If all works well those files can be deleted but if anything goes wrong you can drag them back.

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Thomas Maude
Thanks for that advice Mick. I used the uninstaller provided on one hard drive and on the second external disk I used the app clean my mac which shows the stuff connected to the app that it uninstalls as well.

I'm off to have a look in the places you suggested as I think the same as you that there is something left somewhere telling the soft wear to set to run at startup. Will let you know what I find and what I do with it.

Tom

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Thomas Maude
Hi Mick Have done all of the things you suggested carefully .......found lot's of bits and pieces left over from both bit's of apps ...Steermouse and LogitechG400 and have removed them all. Have restarted and no luck ! more scouring and restarting and fixing of permissions have still not removed it. Any suggestions of the next step or what to try next most welcome.

Tom

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Mick Burrell
What was the position regarding Mavericks compatibility?

Shows how well uninstall apps works doesn't it!

There's a preference folder in the System Library too - try there.

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Lionel Ogden
When I installed Lion I lost the startup chime from my iMac. Not a massive problem and something which one or two people thought was a blessing. However, it wasn't right and nothing I could think of doing corrected it. That was until I reinstalled Lion. This restored the chime.

It might be something to think about. I cannot comment on what effect Mavericks has had as Lion was the last upgrade I was able to apply to my ancient (six years old) iMac

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Thomas Maude
Hi Mick and Lionel thanks for sticking with this thorny problem. Mick The steermouse app had a Mavericks download which I downloaded but this didn't help. yes your right about the uninstall apps they do leave things behind that need hoovering up manually. Lionel thanks for this bit of info I will try to do the same.......I to have a mac that is over six years old ! and was running lion till I upgraded .....will try and have a go at a reinstall tomorrow ......and also look in the system library in detail ....had a cursory (excuse the pun but one must keep a sense of humour even in the depths of despair) look in the system library but ever since Euan told me many years ago that the systems library was a no go area and to tread carefully in there I have given it a wide berth. But will have a go tomorrow also.

Many Thanks for your reply's guys

Tom

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Mick Burrell
Euan is right and I'd say be careful in the user library too but if you drag suspect files to the desktop and it hasn't cured things when you restart, you can always delete the new file that's been created and drag the old one back.

Do Steermouse or Logitech offer support?

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Euan Williams
Hi Thomas, just read about your mouse woes.

Apple Mouse:
I’m not clear whether your rectangle disappears when you are using your Apple mouse. If it does, use that and consider investing in an Apple TrackPad. These are expensive, and would mean a serious overhaul of muscle memory, but finger swiping may be a lot more more rewarding than messing with the Logitech mouse.

In view of the Great Storm Michael Fish’s successors are promising for tonight it may be wise to wait for the electrical supply to settle down before doing anything radical ;-)
——————————————————————————————---------
One or two (possibly trivial) morsels to add to Mick and Lionel’s advice:

I think Lionel has in mind installing Mavericks “on top of” the current Mavericks installation (i.e. a second time) after removing all SteerMouse and Logitech grittynitty driver files from everywhere. He’s right, this can sometimes help.

Remember that there may be some conflict left-over corruption caused by SteerMouse and/or Logitech drivers which continues to blight your Mac Life even when the grittynitty files have been removed.
———————————————
Other web Discussions:
Logitech Forums has a long discussion (four pages) about “Freezing mice” (but not, so far as I have read, Mouse cursor black rectangle) with suggestions such as uninstalling all Logitech drivers and then re-installing driver v.3.80.

No fixes for the “freeze” appear to be particularly successful so far.
> http://forums.logitech.com/t5/Mice-and-Pointing-Devices/OSX-Mavericks-Support/td-p/1114193/page/3 <

The Logitech ‘go-to’ guy seems to be
> http://forums.logitech.com/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/21 <

I note that you have tried the Steermouse update for Mavericks.
———————————————
Safe Boot and System files:
Restarting with Safe Boot excludes all non-Apple software as well as doing a variety of undisclosed housework, particularly wiping caches and your Spotlight records. As your problem disappears under safe boot it is unlikely that messing about with System > Library > PreferencePanes > Mouse.prefPane (as opposed to your main and User Libraries) will have an effect and (may) make you more unhappy. It is Apple’s private domain, for the good reason that it needs to be standard and reliable (Unix is pretty fanatical about this sort of thing.)

An alternative to messing with System could be to go to System Preferences > Accounts > and make a new Admin Account (I call mine Mr Clean) restart with this as the open account and see if that clears the air. You can later make a new personal one and remove your existing account, just be careful that you don’t import anything corrupted by the current drivers issue.

If you are sorely tempted to mess with your System > Library check the contents of your existing one with those of a brand new fresh install Mavericks library to see any differences that may be relevant.

Tip: in the System Library folder window, “select all” then open a Text Edit window and Edit > “Paste and Match Style”. This will list the files in any open folder. If you have Excel, Numbers or Libre Office you can then copy this list and any others into your spreadsheet in neighbouring columns and compare easily.
——————————————

Anther install option:
Having made sure that your backups (clone, time machine or whatever) work, use Disk Utility to erase a partition on your Mac so that the partition is pristine. Then clean-install Mavericks on that partition. This will have absolutely no Logitech/SteerMouse grittynitty on it.

Then use the option to add your information from your backup (clone/Time Machine) whether on another partition on your Mac drive or from an external drive. Make sure you have removed all the grittynitty from that clone first.

If you do this on an external drive partition (and success attends your efforts) you can then clone that back to an (erased) partition on your Mac.

Not sure if this is a helpful addition to the suggestions and advice you already have, but Good Luck and let us know about progress.

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Thomas Maude
Thanks for all the suggestions ..just to answer your first query Euan ..I am now using my mac mouse and the rectangle of death surrounds it as it has been ever present since the upgrade.

I'm just wondering about how I updated from the app store ...Ive downloaded the update twice now and used the migration assistant both times which has worked smoothly ...apart from the rectangle of doom appearing that is ! ....

I haven't actually seen a physical icon or anything like like when I downloaded so when I think about some kind of option at reinstalling I don't know were the 5.4GB of data is on my computer in order to use it.

So when you guys downloaded from the app store were did the icon appear for you ..and have you any idea were mine would be ..or is it that because I used the migration assistant from 10.7.5 thats why I don't have something I can double click on. Hope that doesn't sound like a daft question.

Tom

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Euan Williams
This (a distant memory hidden behind cobwebs blown away by the Great St Jude Storm) may be the answer to your problem:
In 10.4.7 a similar rectangle could very occasionally appear. The solution was to delete
> com.apple.universalaccess.plist <

Go to Users > Tom > Library > Preferences
(to open your User Library you should keep the option key pressed when accessing the Finder’s Go menu).

Restart.

If this is a fix everything that follows is “purely educational”. If not…
=============================================================
The updater is called “Install OS X Mavericks” and the icon is a white circle enclosing the Green (mavericks) X above which there hovers a down-pointing grey graduated arrow. You can use cmnd-f or spotlight to find it.

It turns up in the main Applications folder of the OSX version you have logged in to, (not your User Applications folder) a little while after you initiate the download from the app store.

The Lion and Mountain Lion installers disappeared without trace as soon as the upgrade was completed, so good practise meant copying the installer to some other place in case it was needed again. I haven’t checked whether it disappears with Mavericks, but it seems sensible to back it up somewhere just in case.

You should absolutely not be using Migration Assistant from 10.7.5 but the new Mavericks one (v.5) not least because it may well have a filter to winkle out incompatible apps of which you possibly have several, and these can cause problems.

Incompatible apps (unless they have been removed by the installer which tells you which ones they are) will show up in the Applications folder with a pale grey “No Entry” sign overlaid on the app icon.

When you do a clean install of Mavericks on a newly erased partition it will ask whether you wish to migrate software to your Mavericks installation. Use “get info” on Migration Assistant: it should be Version 5, and is in the (newly installed) Applications > Utilities folder.

Your probable best course of action now is to locate your “Install OS X Mavericks” file — unless it has disappeared (see above) in which case you will have to download it again. Back it up this time, too.

Make a freshly erased partition (erase the latest unsuccessful installation again), install Mavericks “clean”, use the Migration option it offers and migrate from a Clone which does NOT include the grittynitty files from Logitech / ScreenMouse.

There is a good reason why your TimeMachine backup may be less suitable. The offending Logitech/ScreenMouse files can’t be removed from TimeMachine before you migrate due to the way T/Mc functions internally. Above all you must NEVER try to open the T/Mc folder and remove them manually from there. The “files” will be there, and the temptation will be obvious, but what you see in the Finder T/Mc window is not necessarily the actual file, but, for want of a simple description, a T/Mc reference file. Removing it might ruin your day :-(

You can read about some basic TimeMachine principles here:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Machine_(Mac_OS)#How_it_works <

Let us know how you get on…

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Thomas Maude
Hi Euan ..Just got home from a 12 hour shift at work which is why I am only replying now ..incidentally St Jude is my confirmation name ..how strange I hadn't remembered to recite the prayer I had learned to him all those years ago ..I have now as he is the patron saint of hopeless cases !!

Have looked in the user library as directed to find com.apple.universalaccess.plist <

No file is named such. here is what is in there
Audio
cf#OTnZR
com.adobe.acrobat.pdfviewer.plist
com.adobe.acrobat.pdfviewer.plist.lockfile
com.adobe.PDFAdminSettings.plist
com.apple.airport.opproam.plist
com.apple.alf.plist
com.apple.alf.plist.lockfile
com.apple.alf.plist~orig
com.apple.AppleFileServer.plist
com.apple.applepushserviced.plist
com.apple.applepushserviced.plist.lockfile
com.apple.apsd.launchd
com.apple.apsd.plist
com.apple.BackToMyMac.plist
com.apple.BezelServices.plist
com.apple.BezelServices.plist.lockfile
com.apple.Bluetooth.plist
com.apple.Bluetooth.plist.lockfile
com.apple.ByteRangeLocking.plist
com.apple.CoreRAIDServer.cfdb
com.apple.dockfixup.plist
com.apple.driver.AppleIRController.plist
com.apple.HIToolbox.plist
com.apple.HIToolbox.plist.lockfile
com.apple.iLife08.plist
com.apple.iPod.plist
com.apple.iWork.plist
com.apple.iWork08.Installer.plist
com.apple.iWork08.plist
com.apple.loginitems.plist
com.apple.loginitems.plist.lockfile
com.apple.loginwindow.plist
com.apple.loginwindow.plist.lockfile
com.apple.MCX.plist
com.apple.mediaio.DeviceSettings.plist
com.apple.networkConfig.plist
com.apple.P2PSupervisor.plist
com.apple.pcast_integration.plist
com.apple.preferences.accounts.plist
com.apple.preferences.accounts.plist.lockfile
com.apple.print.defaultpapersize.plist
com.apple.print.FaxPrefs.plist
com.apple.print.makequeues.plist
com.apple.print.makequeues.plist.lockfile
com.apple.proapps.plist
com.apple.QuickTime.plist
com.apple.RegFinalCutExpress.plist
com.apple.security.appsandbox.plist
com.apple.security.plist
com.apple.security.systemidentities.plist
com.apple.SetupAssistant.plist
com.apple.SoftwareUpdate.plist
com.apple.SoftwareUpdate.plist.lockfile
com.apple.soundpref.plist
com.apple.storeagent.plist
com.apple.TimeMachine.plist
com.apple.TimeMachine.plist.lockfile
com.apple.updatesetings.plist
com.apple.windowserver.plist
com.apple.xgrid.agent.plist
com.apple.xgrid.controller.plist
com.apple.xsanmgrd.plist
com.epson.Epson Customer Research Participation.UnInstallList.plist
com.epson.Epson Web Support.UnInstallList.plist
com.epson.EpsonNet Config v4.UnInstallList.plist
com.epson.Inkjet Printer Driver.UnInstallList.plist
com.epson.TpManual.plist
com.maintain.cocktail.plist
com.microsoft.office.licensing.plist
com.microsoft.office.licensing.plist.lockfile
com.microsoft.PlayReady.plist
com.skype.skype.plist
com.sophos.notification.plist
com.sophos.sau.plist
com.sophos.sav.plist
DirectoryService
DRM
Epson
loginwindow.plist
loginwindow.plist.lockfile
OpenDirectory
org.cups.printers.plist
Soundtrack
SystemConfiguration
TechTool Pro 4
Xsan

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Euan Williams
Hi Tom, related to the previous suggestion, go to this website and see whether this is the black cursor "rectangle" you are seeing:

http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/zoompreview1048.html

if it is, a solution is posted lower down the web page. If not, then it's St Jude's Cap time and you should perhaps take a long cool look at the install procedures in my last post.

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Thomas Maude
Thanks Euan ..yes that is indeed the rectangle of doom ..imagine that following your every move on the screen ! off to have a look at the suggestions to remove it ...will let you know ....thanks for finding this ..

Tom

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Thomas Maude
Euan I'm torn between your good self and St Jude ...I may now actually rename you St Euan ! patron saint of lost mac causes !!

It was the zoom thing.... "Deselect Show preview rectangle when zoomed out". The preview rectangle should disappear.....and it did like magic !

I just want to thank everyone who stuck this with this right from the start ..Mick gave me options and hope that there was a solution somewhere around the corner Lionel chimed in with another option .....and then like an Atlantic storm from the west came a persistent wind of change that refused to yield in the face of magic zooming rectangles ..none other than the wizard of the mac magic circle ( pardon the pun ) ......saints were also mystics in St Judes time and had inner seeing powers even without access to google and wikipedia !

Thank you Euan ..you have slain the rectangle of doom ...and I am so grateful to you

many many thanks

Tom

Re: mouse and cursor issue in Mavericks

Avatar Euan Williams
Good. All thanks to St Jude's storm blowing away the cobwebs from an old memory.

Never give up, there's always an answer out there somewhere :-)

and enjoy Mavericks, it's full of hidden delights.
 
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