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Monterey jumpy mouse cursor

T

TheRealDrJones

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 22, 2019
33
32
Hi!

I'm experiencing jumpy mouse behaviour in Monterey. The cursor jumps multiple pixels (maybe 2-3 px) at once when moving at slow speed and in an erratic manner, which is very distracting. It looks as if it hangs until some distance was travelled and then jumps that distance at once. This has nothing to do with the (abysmal) mouse acceleration.

Setup:
  • M1 Macbook Pro
  • macOS 12.1 12.3
  • External 4k display
  • No-name USB mouse
Things I tried:
  • Different mouse settings
  • Different mouse
  • Closing the lid and using only the external monitor
  • Using only the internal monitor
  • Fiddling with the refresh rates of both monitors
  • Changing the resolution from scaled to native
  • USB Overdrive and Steer Mouse
Nothing works.

Then I tried to make a screen recording to show you the problem, and guess what? It's smooth on the video! I can move the real cursor next to the recorded one and the difference is clearly visible. So that means that macOS does recognize the movement precisely but only fails to render it correctly.

The same mouse works fine on my old MBP with Catalina by the way.

Does anyone have the same problem?

Dang, I wish someone at Apple would just rewrite the whole mouse thing in macOS and make it smooth like Windows.
 
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1. Are you connecting mouse through a USB hub/dock or directly to the USB-C port?
2. Is it an externally powered hub/dock?
3. Try plugging mouse directly into the USB-C port.

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Thanks for the suggestion. It was connected to the monitor's port but the problem remains when I plug it directly into the usb-c ports.
 
As well as this I've started having problems with the keyboard which shares the same dongle as the mouse, connecting via the USB-C hub. The Mac stops receiving input for a while and then just starts again, sometimes emptying a buffer of keypresses into whatever app you are working with. It got worse after upgrading to 12.3.1. Only switched to a Mac 18 months ago and I'm pretty disappointed with its inability to support external peripherals.
 
I suggest to try connect without the hub to see if the problem remains. Also try the keyboard on another device, to see if it happens there, too. Have you installed anything that might interfere?
 
The keyboard/mouse uses a USB dongle so I need the hub to connect it. It works fine on my Windows PC. I do use Karabiner to map keys but the problem only got worse after upgrading the OS - no other software changes.
 
Try deactivating Universal Control (while leaving EVERYTHING connected as it was, hub dongle and all).

 Menu -> System Preferences -> Displays -> Disallow your cursor to move between nearby Mac or iPad

My MacBook Air 2020 started showing whacky cursor behavior right after the Universal Control feature was added in the incremental update.

Hope that helps!
 
That sounded like it might help but sadly it was not enabled. I have no other Apple devices.
 
I have the same problem with an M1 MacBook Air using the built-in trackpad. I do not have Universal Control enabled. Have experienced this in the past occasionally but since 12.3.1 seems to be every single day and it's extremely annoying. It seems to resolve itself after a few minutes of use but then comes back at random times.
 
Same ***** on a Dell U2723QE connected via USB-C to a 13" M1 MacBook Pro running Mojave 12.6 – jittery mouse on the external display, smooth when moving over to the MacBook display.

Edit:
Removing the USB-C cable from the MacBook and putting it back again made the cursor move smooth on the external display again. Until it happens next time, I assume…
 
I had this issue as well after 12.6. I tried a different bluetooth mouse and it went away. Not sure what was up with that, but now normal mouse movements again.
 
I appreciate all of your feedback, but the issue here has nothing to do with the mouse or the usb connection.
When I zoom in I can see that the mouse is moving exactly at half the resolution, basically skipping every second pixel. As if the mouse was in non-retina mode, if that makes sense.
That‘s what makes it feel so jerky.
A friend of mine has it too, so it’s probably a bug in Monterey. Let‘s hope it gets fixed in Ventura.

Please let me know if anyone can confirm this or knows how to fix it.
 
TheRealDrJones said:
I appreciate all of your feedback, but the issue here has nothing to do with the mouse or the usb connection.
When I zoom in I can see that the mouse is moving exactly at half the resolution, basically skipping every second pixel. As if the mouse was in non-retina mode, if that makes sense.
That‘s what makes it feel so jerky.
A friend of mine has it too, so it’s probably a bug in Monterey. Let‘s hope it gets fixed in Ventura.

Please let me know if anyone can confirm this or knows how to fix it.
Click to expand...
So it happens also when you don't use an external display?
 
Just had it happen to me now. Mouse pointer movement was jittery on the external screen, but smooth if I moved over to the MacBook display. Funny thing is, as I was testing this out moving back and forth between the displays alls of a sudden it got smooth on the external display too. 🤷‍

Edit:
Hmm… If you look in System Preferences -> Displays and look at the settings for ”Scaled” there, some resolutions will show as ”Using a scaled resolution may affect performance”, i.e. when the resolution scaling number is uneven to that of the native resolution of the display that can cause performance issues. I wonder if this has got anything to do with it. 🤔
 
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Another thing I observed; sometimes when grabbing a window and moving it around it is jumpy too, almost as if the movement is at 30 Hz despite the display being set to 60 Hz. This made me try to set the display to 30 Hz and then back to 60 Hz which made moving of windows and mouse pointer smooth again.

I wonder what it is that triggers it – it sure is pretty annoying.

Edit:

Still don't know what triggers it, but manage to capture it on video – both the jumpy mouse pointer and also window movement update being jumpy (in slow motion). Can also mention that I had the jumpy mouse pointer while just using the built-in screen of the MacBook, so it can happen also without using an external display.

Jumpy mouse pointer:


Jumpy window (slow motion):


Smooth window (slow motion) after changing display to 30 Hz and then back to 60 Hz:
 
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If it comes and goes it may be some runaway process stressing the CPU. Have you tried bringing up Activity Monitor and seeing what is using the most CPU when this happens?

Accessibility also has a few options that affact the mouse.

Accessibility > Display > Pointer
Accessibility > Pointer Control

Might try fiddling with those or reverting them to default if they've been changed. I know at some point in the past that there was a huge memory leak when the cursor was changed from its default size and/or color. Maybe this is something like that?
 
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No, it has been like that all the time since I got this machine, even when it's idle.
I think it's a bug and if more people experience this, maybe we can get Apple's attention.
 
I used to face this, but with my MBP 2017

Can't remember exactly, but the problem was somewhere near resolutions (whether tinkered with an internal or external display) + with a sort of ELMB feature (or whatever was that)

A decisive option was related to screen resolutions or some display feature (can't reproduce the problem at this moment)
 
Options:

1) Try Apple Diagnostics to see if it reports any problems.
2) Update to 12.6 to see if that corrects the problem.
3) See if the problem occurs while booted into Safe Mode.
4) Try creating a new user account and test if it happens there.
5) Take it to the Apple Store and let them have a crack at it.
6) Throw up your hands and give up, swearing never to use Macs ever again.
 
I had it happen regularly throughout the day the last few days and decided to do a restart yesterday to see if that helps. Haven't seen any jumpy mouse pointer or windows since. So for now it's gone for me. Monterey 12.6 since it was released. Until it happens again I guess – I wonder what triggers it. 🤔

I wonder if Venture will be different when it comes to this. I guess it's not unlikely. Seems there's often changes to graphics frameworks between major macOS updates and also changes to graphics drivers in every point update. If that's got to do with it…
 
Interesting. My MBP 2016 with Catalina didn't have this problem.
I have tried every possible option in the display settings but nothing helped.
 
star-affinity said:
I had it happen regularly throughout the day the last few days and decided to do a restart yesterday to see if that helps. Haven't seen any jumpy mouse pointer or windows since. So for now it's gone for me. Monterey 12.6 since it was released. Until it happens again I guess – I wonder what triggers it. 🤔

I wonder if Venture will be different when it comes to this. I guess it's not unlikely. Seems there's often changes to graphics frameworks between major macOS updates and also changes to graphics drivers in every point update. If that's got to do with it…
Click to expand...
I suspect it has something to do with how the cursor gets rendered on screen. The way the cursor behaves, it seems to me that the underlying mouse coordinates are fine, but during rendering it snaps to a half resolution grid.
 
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