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#6204: Glidepoint / serial mouse autoswitch

If you use a serial mouse at the office, but the built-in glidepoint on the road, use one of these handy procedures to make your notebook automatically use the serial mouse if it is present.

OPTION 1 (best): Micro International's MakeSearch 95 utility.

This utility, a mint exclusive, is copyrighted. Do not run it on any non-mint notebooks. It works by making the Alps driver check the COM1 port for a mouse before any other port. The alps driver then defaults to the PS/2 glidepoint if no mouse is present on COM1.

  1. Make sure you have the Alps Glidepoint Driver installed as noted in Tech Note 6201 or 6203.
  2. Download this file: mksalps.exe to your \win95 directory, or whatever other directory that you installed Windows 95 to.
  3. Edit your \win95\win.ini file using Notepad (in Start/Programs/Accessories). If you installed Windows 95 in another directory, you'll need to edit the win.ini file in that directory.
  4. Beside the line run=, add mksalps.exe. There may be other .exe's there already; just make sure there is a space between each seperate .exe. If there are no other exe's listed, you will end up with run=mksalps.exe for that line.
  5. Save the file and restart your system twice. Now you can plug in a serial mouse to COM1 and use it, and it will always override the built-in glidepoint.

OPTION 2 (good): Frozen mouse.ini file.

  1. Make sure the Alps Glidepoint (r) driver is installed as referenced in tech note #6201 or #6203, and delete all other mouse drivers.
  2. Set all the options for cursor size, mouse responsiveness, etc. to fit your requirements.
  3. Edit the \win95\alps\gpoint\mouse.ini file and change the mousetype= setting to Serial1.
  4. Click on the Win 95 Start button, then click on Programs and MS-DOS Prompt.
  5. Type attrib +r \win95\alps\gpoint\mouse.ini [Enter] at the prompt.
  6. Type exit [Enter] at the prompt.
  7. Restart Windows 95. Your mouse.ini file is "frozen" to always try to use a serial mouse first. The mouse driver will switch to the glidepoint if a serial mouse is not present.

OPTION 3 (in case of emergency ...):

  1. This option is only to be used if you do not have the Alps glidepoint driver available.
  2. Delete all mouse drivers in the System / Device Manager section of the Control Panel and restart Windows.
  3. Windows will detect a "PS/2 compatible mouse port." Double-click on the the System / Device Manager listing for this device, then disable this device for the current hardware profile.
  4. In the control panel, add new hardware. Do not allow it to search. Add a standard serial port mouse. Restart Windows.
  5. Ignore the (!) error beside the System / Device manager listing for the standard serial mouse and the red X beside the PS/2 compatible mouse port. The system will use the Serial Port Mouse if it is available, and switch to the PS/2 glidepoint if a serial mouse is not found.

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