How to Disable Dell Mouse Stick Pointer on Windows 7

I personally find this Dell mouse stick pointer very annoying. It always messes up my typing. Thus I always had it disabled. All of a sudden, today it is enabled. It turns out that Dell Touchpad application no longer exists in my laptop. I don't understand how and why this could happen. It could be related to Windows update. In order to disable it, I have to re-install Dell Touchpad application. After the reboot, Dell Touchpad will show up in Mouse Properties so that I can configure it. The following is the procedure of how to disable this mouse stick pointer.

• If you don't have Dell Touchpad application installed, go Dell Support site to download and install it. Most of time, a reboot is required after installation.
• Go Control Panel.
• Select All Control Panel Items.
  
  
  
  Or type mouse at the search box and then select Change mouse settings.
  
  
  
  
• If you have Dell Touchpad application installed, Dell Touchpad tab will show up. Click on the image inside the Dell Touchpad tab content.
  
  
  
  
• Select Button Settings from Dell Touchpad window.
  
  
  
  
• Select Device Select tab and click Disable radio button of Pointing Stick and then click Apply.
  
  
• The mouse stick pointer will be disabled instantly. Click OK and then exit the Dell Touchpad application.

Note that the above procedure/pictures are captured from my Latitude E6510.

How to change the Gateway Metric on Windows 7

If there are multiple physical adapters present in the network, Windows 7 will always look at and compare the indices of gateway metric among the physical adapters and then pick the one with the lowest index to use. In order to override the default settings, you need to adjust the index of gateway metric for each physical adapter. The adapter assigned with the lowest index will always take precedence and used by Windows 7 automatically. For instance, if you want to use the wired connection when both wired and wireless are available in your network. You need to assign the lower gateway metric index to your LAN card so that you can ensure that your favorite adapter will be used by Windows 7 whenever it is available. In my previous post, I mentioned how to use route change command to adjust gateway metric index. In this post, I will present you an easy way to do it without going to the command prompt.

• Open Network Connection from Network and Sharing Center. Or type ncpa.cpl in the search box at your Windows Explorer or Start menu.
• Select your favorite connection, e.g., Local Area Connection and then right click to select Properties.
• In the Networking tab, select the Internet protocol version, e.g., Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4).
• And then click Properties button.
• In protocol Properties dialog box, click Advanced....
• Inside the Advanced TCP/IP Settings, at the IP Settings tab, click Add... of the Default gateways.
• Uncheck the Automatic metic checkbox, and then enter your router IP (e.g. 192.168.1.1) and assign your metric index. Click Add to insert the entry.
  
  
• Click all OK's to exit.

The changes will immediately take effect. If you check your route table after changes (using route print command), you'll find a new entry in the Persistent Routes.

===========================================================================
Persistent Routes:
  Network Address          Netmask  Gateway Address  Metric
          0.0.0.0          0.0.0.0      192.168.1.1      20
===========================================================================

Regardless of the IP address obtained automatically or statically, changing gateway metric can be done via either route change command or network connection GUI (ncpa.cpl).

When you use route print to verify your settings, the metric indices usually will double the number you enter.

Use netsh int ip show config will show the exact settings you will find in the network connection properties.

I hope you'll find this information useful to you.

Forcing Windows 7 to use wired when available

For unknown reason, Windows 7 prefers using wireless connection over wired. In order to force Windows 7 to use the wired connection when available, you need to adjust the setting of gateway metric among network adapters. A lot of posts found online recommended to do it via via Network Connection (ncpa.cpl) by unchecking Automatic metric checkbox and manually setting Interface metric on each network adapter. Unfortunately, this only updates interface metric, not gateway metric. Thus, it won't have any effect on Windows 7 and the problem persists.

You can type the following command at the command prompt for the detail of your network adapter settings [see example]:

netsh int ip show config

Or type the following for the settings of the route table. In this command, the metric column is only for gateway metric. [see example]

route print

To change gateway metric, there are two options. First is to use route change command at the command prompt. For example,

route change 0.0.0.0 mask 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.1 metric 20 if 13

where

• 0.0.0.0 is the target network destination (IP address) found in route table.


• mask 0.0.0.0 is the subnet mask associated with the target network destination.


• 192.168.1.1 is the IP address of the gateway, my router.


• metric 20 is setting gateway metric to 20. The network interface with a lower metric takes precedence. In this example, I am assigning 20 to my wired network card, which receives the lowest gateway metric. It enforces Windows 7 to use the wired whenever it is available. Also see KB299540.


• if 13 means to apply the changes only to the network interface index equivalent to 13. In this example, 13 is my Intel(R) 82577LM Gigabit Network Connection that can be found in the Interface List section of route print.

There is no need to log out or reboot. The changes should take effect immediately.

The second option presented in my next post may be the preferable way, especially if you don't want to execute any command. Go and see my next how-to.

References:
The meaning of metric numbers, see KB299540.
How to use Route Command.

Example of netsh int ip show config

Configuration for interface "Wireless Network Connection"
    DHCP enabled:                         Yes
    IP Address:                           192.168.1.2
    Subnet Prefix:                        192.168.1.0/24 (mask 255.255.255.0)
    Default Gateway:                      192.168.1.1
    Gateway Metric:                       25
    InterfaceMetric:                      50    DNS servers configured through DHCP:  192.168.1.1
                                          192.168.1.1
                                          ...
                                          ...
    Register with which suffix:           Primary only
    WINS servers configured through DHCP: None

Configuration for interface "Local Area Connection"
    DHCP enabled:                         No
    IP Address:                           192.168.1.200
    Subnet Prefix:                        192.168.1.0/24 (mask 255.255.255.0)
    Default Gateway:                      192.168.1.1
    Gateway Metric:                       256
    InterfaceMetric:                      20    Statically Configured DNS Servers:    192.168.1.1
                                          ...
    Register with which suffix:           Primary only
    Statically Configured WINS Servers:   None
...

Example of route print

The column of Metric in the section of IPv4 Route Table is gateway metric.

===========================================================================
Interface List
 13...5c 26 0a 23 40 d5 ......Intel(R) 82577LM Gigabit Network Connection
 14...00 24 d7 6c a6 fc ......Intel(R) Centrino(R) Ultimate-N 6300 AGN
 15...00 24 d7 6c a6 fd ......Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport Adapter
 10...5c ac 4c fd 7b 5e ......Bluetooth Device (Personal Area Network)
 16...00 50 56 c0 00 01 ......VMware Virtual Ethernet Adapter for VMnet1
 17...00 50 56 c0 00 08 ......VMware Virtual Ethernet Adapter for VMnet8
  1...........................Software Loopback Interface 1
===========================================================================

IPv4 Route Table
===========================================================================
Active Routes:
Network Destination        Netmask          Gateway       Interface  Metric
          0.0.0.0          0.0.0.0      192.168.1.1    192.168.1.200    266
          0.0.0.0          0.0.0.0      192.168.1.1      192.168.1.2     50
        127.0.0.0        255.0.0.0         On-link         127.0.0.1    306
        127.0.0.1  255.255.255.255         On-link         127.0.0.1    306
  127.255.255.255  255.255.255.255         On-link         127.0.0.1    306
      192.168.1.0    255.255.255.0         On-link     192.168.1.200    266
      192.168.1.0    255.255.255.0         On-link       192.168.1.2    281
      192.168.1.2  255.255.255.255         On-link       192.168.1.2    281
      ...                      ...            ...                ...    ...