Cursor shoots to random screen corner...

Any bluetooth devices attached? I recall one weird experience reported here where a bluetooth keyboard with something on top of it in a drawer in another room was sending random keystrokes to a computer.

Also try a new mouse to see if the problem goes away

 

Buy a new mouse mat... When they get shiny they do all wierd things do infra red?/laser based mice. Best kind of mouse mat in my opinion a green cutting mat.

just my 2 pence worth...

 

I have the same problem with my kensington optical pro mouse i got it replaced but still the same problems.

 

Best advice in the thread.

 

I believe it the fact that you are not using the one button mouse. My parents got a iMac G5, and it worked just fine with the single button. But they wanted the right click so I picked up a Microsoft Two button mouse, the colorful ones, and since then it can jump to corners randomly. I think the fact that its two buttons is what does the Mac in for some reason.

 

My ideal mouse pad

I've used a ton of different mouse pads and found that for me the ideal mouse pad for an optical mouse is a legal pad (writing tablet). The legal pad serves two purposes: it seems I'm always jotting something down while I'm working at the computer and so I can do so on my legal pad/mouse pad, and for some reason, the surface of the paper seems an ideal reflective surface for any optical mouse I've tried it on. Writing on the pad seems to have absolutely no ill effect on mouse tracking and if the top page gets unattractively filled or grungy, I just tear the page off and I have a clean one underneath.

Plus, it saves the desk space that I would need to have a writing tablet and a separate mouse pad both at hand.

 

The best mouse mats I've always found are material ones. I had some trouble with my mouse flying places when I used it on just my desk, and with a plastic surfaced mat.
The only disadvantage with the material ones is they begin to peel at the sides after a few months. I buy a few from Staples at a time (around £1 each) and just replace them.

 

No, I can't go along with that conclusion - I have used 2 button MS and logitech mice on my Macs ever since USB came out with no problems of this type.

Other things to look for: bad USB connection, depleted battery in a wireless mouse, intermittant USB hub.

 

I'm with the "get a new mouse pad" camp--based on your description that's GOT to be what's happening. Every time I've seen spastic mouse movement with an optical mouse, it's been because of the surface underneath. You want to find something unreflective with an even pattern, like an old-school grey cloth mousepad or the legal paper pad mentioned above.

At home, I use a solid-black gel mousepad to fairly good effect, although since the surface is sort of a shiny synthetic fabric instead of something more cotton-like, I've noticed that if you mouse "against the grain" (that is, with the pad at an angle to the mouse) most optical mice get very unhappy and the cursor gets twitchy. Probably has something to do with how the grain of the fabric reflects light.

To give an extreme example, at work I use a really old plastic "Apple" mousepad (the kind they used to give away years ago), and my mouse hates it because of the sharp transitions between light grey and black--if I move slowly it's ok, but moving speedily over the letters periodically confuses it and slamms the cursor into the corner. I still use it knowing this for nostalgic reasons, but it can be annoying and does this with all but the best optical sensors.

 

the mouse will shoot to the corner when I make sharp quick movements.

 

Wow I bought my new mouse pad 3 days ago and i've had no problems at all!

 

Same here. It's pretty damn annoying.

 

Definitely go with a mouse mat. I had that problem all the time with my Apple optical mouse, but rarely ever have that with the mat.