Wondering if that may be due to brushing contact with the ALPS touchpad while typing. You could go into the control panel>mouse and disable it if you are using a USB mouse now

This is a common problem with many laptops. What is going on usually is that you are brushing the touchpad as you type and it messes with cursor placement. Some laptops are more sensitive to this than others. The only solution I know, if you can't avoid brushing the touchpad, is to open the mouse controls and disable the touchpad, at least temporarily when you are doing a lot of typing. You can also set the mouse controls on some laptops to automatically disable the touchpad whenever an external mouse is plugged in. This is the approach I use since I prefer to use an external mouse over a touchpad.

What is touchpad?

The touchpad is a small pad near the front of the keyboard on laptop computers so those travelling can run their finger across it to move the mouse to the desired spot. Your finger imitates the mouse I guess you could say

Obwist;
Thank you for your reply. You are always helpful. I have a laptop and I should read my manual more carefully.

I think you hit the problem. I do have an external mouse because I don't like the touch pad. But for the life of me I can't find where to disable the darn touch pad. I went to the Control Panel...and can't find anything on disabling touch pad.

I have an HP Pavillion lap top and at the top of the touchpad is a small button with an O and slash line thru it. It lights up blue when the LP is on which indicates the touchpad is on. I just have to hit the button to turn it off. Mine is simple and easy to turn off and on........guess not all laptops have the same feature. Sure glad mine does *lol*

On every Toshiba notebook Touch Pad can be disabled on two different ways. The first one is using FN+F9 key combination or using DISABLE option in mouse properties

what do I do?????...I have a Dell...anyone out there that has a Dell laptop?

Go to control panel and click on Mouse properties icon. Click device select tab and check "Disable Touch Pad when USB Pointing Device is present.

I did exactlly what you said but I can't find tab so I can't check disable touch pad...for some wacky reason.

Sorry about the Toshiba thing, just came from the Toshiba notebook forum and put that in by mistake. Did a google search on your brand/model problem and found this:

Here is a link that might be useful: Dell inspiron 1525

If you look at the far lower-right area of your screen, you should see a bunch of icons on a taskbar. Move your mouse cursor slowly over each until a brief explanation of the icon pops up. One of them says "Dell Touchpad". Double-click on that icon. Four touchpads will appear. Click on the words "Device Select" near the upper-left picture. On the next screen, go to the bottom and put a check in the box that says, "Disable Touchpad/Pointing Stick when external USB mouse is present." Then click OK. Hopefully that should do it.

I, too, have a Dell desktop with XP and recently got the Inspiron 1525 with Vista. That touchpad drove me crazy as I've always used a mouse and you can't help but brush against the touchpad.

Hope this helps.

camp56: Sorry, didn't mean to repeat exactly what you recommended!

cricketm: When you go to control panel and click on mouse, click on the big brown arrow that appears on the next screen. Then click on the words "device select" and continue as outlined above.

This is what genes was getting at and his link will lead you to the driver from Dell.

You MUST have the official Synaptics Touchpad drivers from the Dell website installed, else the 'Dell Touchpad' tab will not show in the mouse configuration window!

Once the drivers are installed, open Control Panel --> Mouse --> Dell Touchpad.
Click on the large screen with an arrow, which will open the touchpad configuration window.
Click on 'Device Select', and right at the bottom is a box which you can tick to 'Disable Touchpad/Pointing Stick when a USB mouse is connected.
As soon as you tick that option, a message will pop up in the taskbar, confirming your selection.

You can make doubly sure however, by also choosing 'Disable' under the Touchpad' heading in the same window.

Be sure to click 'Apply' once you've made your selections.

seattlemike, genes, camp56, zep...et al....you are so nice to try and help me....but I still stuck. I have a lady from the Phillipines (working for Dell**) calling me this morning..I hope.

I never use the keypad...I am a typist....I love to type....
what if I uninstall the keypad driver --- I don't like it.

**You mean to tell me there are no USA citizens that work for Dell. I can't believe it....where are our technical people?

You all helped me! I went to the site that Genes told me to go "fixya.com". Scroll through the posters with a similar problem as I had. This one worked... I now have a Dell Touchpad icon on my system tray by downloading the suggested download. My touch pad is disable...thank you, thank you, thank you....I really appreciate your advice. I am typing like mad and love it. Thanks again.

Here is the information in case anyone else has the problem with Dell Inspirion....

"I had the same problem, contacted Dell and they had me download the following driver: http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R176423&SystemID=INS_PNT_PM_1525&servicetag=6Z6GNF1&os=WLH&osl=en&deviceid=14029&devlib=0amp;typecnt=0amp;vercnt=2&catid=-1&impid=-1&formatcnt=1&libid=17&fileid=239968

I then had the touch pad icon on the right hand side of the task bar, clicked on it, selected touch pad, and unclicked the click options. Worked grea ,so far."

Glad all is working fine now