Vista - Screensaver Causes Paused Movie to Play and Missing Cursor in Media Center

Hi all I have read wat u wrote guys and I am experiancing the same prob. I thought it might have been a virus affecting the functionality and I rebooted my comp with the back up cd ORIGINAL copy of windows I made as part of the HP computer line up so no dodgy work and I am still experiancing this prob, if media center is running and its paused or stopped a movie and the screensaver comes on movie starts automatically and same prob with it turning on automatically from sleep mode or not goin to sleep sometimes. One of the things I was told by HP support center regarding the sleep mode is that the optical mouse any line will affect it and turn the comp on or any usb plugged in which doesnt make sense cause its usually dark at nite and sometimes neva experiance that during the day if media center is not running in the background

Billy doesn't run the show anymore, you should all know that.

(didn't want to spoil the topic entirely by posting a full fledged youtube link... heh)

I have a related problem in that I've never been able to see a cursor in Media Center. That's been the case since I purchased the PC about a year ago which is a standard HP Pavilion ab6130n. The only software installed right after I purchased the PC was Kaspersky Internet Security Suite. They responded that I should look into updated video device drivers which I did and installed. Still no cursor I searched the HP site, the MS sites, etc. and had no luck finding an answer. So I gave up on Media Center. I've used a number of other programs to handle all of my A/V needs so it's not been a major issue. It would be nice to be able to explore Media Center and try out it features. I might like it.
A more pressing problem I have is a momentaryly disappearing cursor which is most noticable when loading a PDF file in Adobe Reader. The real problem here is that if I'm moving the cursor during this process I loose all input function. No keyboard or mouse input. The hard drive continues to run in the same manor as before this occurs so I don't believe the system is completely locked up. I've even left the PC running(?) for up to an hour before trying again to use the mouse or keyboard but still no luck. Only thing I can do is to hold down the power button until the PC turns off. Any Ideas??

I found that if you turn pointer trails ON (visibility), it messes up the pointer in the MCE window. Turning it off should fix at least that part of your problem (go to mouse settings)...

It works!! I now have a cursor in the Vista MCE. Thanks for the tip! Such an easy minor visual change to make the MCE functional. Wonder why this fix was so hard to discover?
I'll post another reply if this fixes my other problem: the system lock up while moving the the invisible cursor thru the upper right quadrant of the screen while a PDF file is loading.
Thanks again for the help.
hDave

Update: More good news!! This change also appears to fix my lock-up problem as well!! I did several test and the cursor never disappeared and no lock-up occurred! I'll post again if this changes after more usage.

Glad it fixed the cursor issue! Want to know the ironical part? I am running MCE 2005 (XP w/SP2), not Vista. This means Microsoft has not fixed this coding issue that has existed for years.

Now, if someone can tell me how to get Fast Forward and Fast Reverse to work correctly, I would be happy too. When I press these keys, the show will advance or reverse, but when I press Play when I get to the desired location, it starts to play but then hangs. I have to press STOP and then PLAY again to continue :-(

Have a nice holiday!

Frank in Michigan

I had all the same issues. The dang media center starting to play every time the screensaver kicked on bugged the heck out of me. But, it's all gone now. After the last update no more issues with the screen saver or mouse. vista premium.