When I try to type a letter in either Word, or MSN Hotmail as I type the cursor will jump around randomly and cause my typing to go back to where the cursor is at. Sometimes I get 3 or 4 sentences completed then all of a sudden I look and I am typing in the middle of the first or maybe the second sentence. I may only start to type and it jumps back to someplace that was previously typed. Not only will it do this in Word, and Hotmail, it wil sometimes even do it in the search bar also 1 person needs an answerI do too

When I try to type a letter in either Word, or MSN Hotmail as I type the cursor will jump around randomly and cause my typing to go back to where the cursor is at. Sometimes I get 3 or 4 sentences completed then all of a sudden I look and I am typing in the middle of the first or maybe the second sentence. I may only start to type and it jumps back to someplace that was previously typed. Not only will it do this in Word, and Hotmail, it wil sometimes even do it in the search bar also Are you using a laptop with a touch pad? If so, you need to reduce its sensitivity. Post the make/model of your computer for possible further directions.

Thank you I have a Dell 1521 Laptop, with a touch pad.

Thank you I have a Dell 1521 Laptop, with a touch pad.The simple answer is to type without letting your thumbs touch the touch pad. Because this may be physically hard to do, you can disable the touchpad (if you have a mouse that you can use instead) or change the touchpad's sensitivity:You can use the Mouse Properties window to disable the touch pad or adjust the touch pad settings.Click Start , and then click ControlPanel . Click Hardware and Sound . Click Keyboard . In the Mouse Properties window: Click the Device Select tab to disable the touch pad. Click the Touch Pad tab to adjust touch pad settings. Click OK to save the settings and close the window. Those instructions (from Dell) appear to be for Vista. In XP, the category is "Printers and Other Hardware" (or, in "classic view" go directly to Keyboard. If the options for the touchpad aren't under "Keyboard," look under "Mouse" instead.

I had tried this and had made sure my hand, thumbs or any body part did not touch the touchpad. It still jumped around and I had to go back and remove what I had just typed. I had thought maybe this was the issue so I was very careful as to placement of my hands. Could it be a driver not being installed. I had recently reformatted my hard drive and then reinstalled my windows XP due to a virus issue. I also reinstalled my Office.

Did you try reducing the touchpad sensitivity?Yes, it could be a driver issue. If you did a clean install of Windows by using an XP install CD (which does involve reformatting the drive), you should have installed the Dell drivers, either from a CD that came with your laptop or downloaded from the Dell site using your Dell Service Tag number. If, on the other hand, you used the Dell restore-to-factory-settings utility, then the drivers would have been installed properly.