Monday 14 December 2009

MacBook Pro - Funky TrackPad Behaviour

While working on a BES 4.x install onto an SBS 2003 server, the MacBook Pro was serving as the source for the instructions via Safari: How to install BlackBerry Enterprise Express on a SBS 2003 Premium on the SmallBizServer.net site.

One of the little gizmos that I came back with after shopping around in the Microsoft Company Store was a Plasma Ball (WikiPedia). You know, the one with the little arcs inside of it that will follow the finger when it touches the glass ball.

The kids thing the ball is absolutely _kewl_!

The instruction page was already up, so the MacBook Pro was left alone for a while during the necessary steps on the part of the SmallBizServer.net site that was showing.

After completing those steps, the MacBook Pro's TrackPad was behaving _very_ strange. The mouse pointer would jump about or seemingly right click (CTRL+Click) at will.

It took a few minutes to figure out what was going on because the Tecra S10's touchpad was not affected by the ball at all. One reboot later and the MacBook's TrackPad was still misbehaving.

The realization that happened was the fact that the plasma ball was plugged in after the page was brought up. Sure enough, when the plasma ball was turned off the TrackPad began to behave again.

Now there is a really strange one for the books!

Philip Elder

MPECS Inc.

Microsoft Small Business Specialists

Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

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