I'm going to give a lot of background, but if I miss something that might help troubleshoot this - let me know please - I will be happy to provide info as best I am able. I'm going to state the problem, the history of when it has worked, and my troubleshooting steps so far.
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The problem: Microsoft Trackball Optical running on Windows 7 Home Ed 64-bit. It has the standard left, right, scroll-buttonclick options as well as two additional programmable buttons to the extreme left and extreme right. I have the extreme left set to "ctrl+c" and the extreme right set to "ctrl+v". These work just fine for copy/paste in any other windows application that I have tried except CoH. I also have CoH set to bind teleport to "ctrl+c" and recall friend set for "ctrl+v" so I can use those buttons in CoH for that purpose, or for copy/paste in chat.
Since upgrading (clean install) to Win7 Home, I have tried using these buttons to copy/paste into/out of chat and for my teleports on long established characters (stating this to indicate that these buttons /did/ work on these toons under previous Windows versions)...and nothing. They just don't work for copy/paste or teleport functions (keyboard ctrl+c and ctrl+v still work fine for both needs)
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Some history:
Okay, in WinXP (32-bit) and Vista Ultimate (64-bit) these functions worked fine. Win 7 CLAIMS to support this trackball and there is Intellipoint software that includes Win7 64-bit support and drivers for this trackball. For the record, I'm using Intellipoint version 7.00.260.0 (latest version), Trackball driver version 7.0.258.0 (version that installs with latest Intellipoint - and according to driver information in Device Manager for the trackball)
I have a second PC set up with XP, I have Synergy software KVM set up to allow my keyboard and mouse from the main PC to work on the second PC without any addition hardware or software - I run my mouse to the screen for the second machine and my keyboard and mouse work there instead of on the main pc (and the mouse button passthrough to CoH did not work before I installed Synergy, so that isn't the issue) until I mouse back to the main PC's screens. The button commands for Ctrl+c and ctrl+v work on the xp machine just fine still, so it isn't that the main PC's mouse setup somehow changes when I run CoH on the main PC.
I have 2 CoH accounts - the issues happen on both when using my main PC (with or without the second PC being powered on).
Troubleshooting:
Just for completeness, I want to state that I have run the updater in default non-compatibility and non-administrator modes. UAC is still turned on and does prompt for access when I launch the updater and I grant it access.
I have tried disabling and uninstalling any other installed mouse hardware/software (the Saitek Magic-Mouse for example that would allow me to use my gamepad as a mouse in Windows) to no effect.
I have tried Intellipoint in administrator mode, upon reboot having the exe to launch intellipoint in administrator mode just resets the trackball buttons back to defaults (back and forward for the browser) - so I shut that off and reset my options to not have it launch as administrator
I have tried mouse settings using the "Enable program-specific settings" option in intellipoint...again, no go.
I have tried ingame to use /bind button1 "powexec_name teleport" for buttons 1-8 with absolutely no effect.
Tried running the CoVUpdater and the CoHUpdater in compatibility mode for XP (SP2 and SP3), as well as Vista (without SP and with SP1 and 2) in all compatibility attempts the updater works fine but the CoH loading screen seems to hang indefinitely and never lets me get to a login prompt.
Tried using "run as administrator" for the updater - logged in just fine, but no button passthrough for those two buttons.
Tried the work-around for bypassing the updater and just launching CoH directly (no compatibility or administrator-specifics listed, just the shortcut addon to allow it to run without the updater calling it)...guess what...it works just fine. But I really don't like running the game without going through the updater. (Does it hurt anything to bypass the updater regularly? As long as I launch the updater long enough each day to make sure there aren't any patches then quit out of the updater before launching without the updater? Is it allowed to bypass the updater except in troubleshooting?)
Two last points -
1. This wouldn't be such a huge issue except that over the 5+ years I've been playing I have /always/ used those buttons for recall and teleport. It is a firmly ingrained habit and as such I'm having real difficulties playing a large number of my toons (teleport is my main travel power on probably 50% of my more than 40 toons). I know I could just try to learn different behaviour for teleport and recall, but it's not turning out to be that easy.
2. Something I did about a week ago also caused the passthrough to work - for one gaming session without using the bypass updater option. I had been in about a zillion areas trying to find a fix for the buttons not behaving properly in any application earlier that day though, so I have absolutely no clue what I did that day - but I haven't had to muck with the mouse software to fix the button assignments for any other apps since that day. Without trying things randomly, and rebooting after each to make sure I clear out holdovers from each tweak - I'm just not sure I can get that to happen again. With that, I'm also not sure I remember even half of the combinations of things I might have tried that day...and if it is a long combination of things that got it working that one time, I'm not sure it would be worthwhile to go through a series of hoops to pretend-tweak settings before every play session - at that point it might be easier to just go back to Vista...but I really like Win7 other than this one teeeny issue.
I do not have access to another PC running Win7 presently (we have a second copy, but my husband hasn't upgraded yet). I have a laptop with Vista Home Premium and a desktop with XP sp3, I could probably also use my husband's laptop (also Vista Home Premium though) or his Vista Ultimate 64bit desktop for troubleshooting in a pinch...I think.
If you need specs for the machine I'm running Win7 on I'll provide those as well, but I think for this it shouldn't be needed...given that I can get the desired behaviour on any PC not on Win7, this PC configuration worked with both XP and Vista, and I get it to work if I bypass the updater and those buttons work fine in every other app I've tried them on. (This does not include trying in any other games with button assignments because other than CoH I play primarily puzzle-casual games with no configuration options - or reason for such options - for the mouse.)
I'm going to give a lot of background, but if I miss something that might help troubleshoot this - let me know please - I will be happy to provide info as best I am able. I'm going to state the problem, the history of when it has worked, and my troubleshooting steps so far.
--
The problem: Microsoft Trackball Optical running on Windows 7 Home Ed 64-bit. It has the standard left, right, scroll-buttonclick options as well as two additional programmable buttons to the extreme left and extreme right. I have the extreme left set to "ctrl+c" and the extreme right set to "ctrl+v". These work just fine for copy/paste in any other windows application that I have tried except CoH. I also have CoH set to bind teleport to "ctrl+c" and recall friend set for "ctrl+v" so I can use those buttons in CoH for that purpose, or for copy/paste in chat.
Since upgrading (clean install) to Win7 Home, I have tried using these buttons to copy/paste into/out of chat and for my teleports on long established characters (stating this to indicate that these buttons /did/ work on these toons under previous Windows versions)...and nothing. They just don't work for copy/paste or teleport functions (keyboard ctrl+c and ctrl+v still work fine for both needs)
--
Some history:
Okay, in WinXP (32-bit) and Vista Ultimate (64-bit) these functions worked fine. Win 7 CLAIMS to support this trackball and there is Intellipoint software that includes Win7 64-bit support and drivers for this trackball. For the record, I'm using Intellipoint version 7.00.260.0 (latest version), Trackball driver version 7.0.258.0 (version that installs with latest Intellipoint - and according to driver information in Device Manager for the trackball)
I have a second PC set up with XP, I have Synergy software KVM set up to allow my keyboard and mouse from the main PC to work on the second PC without any addition hardware or software - I run my mouse to the screen for the second machine and my keyboard and mouse work there instead of on the main pc (and the mouse button passthrough to CoH did not work before I installed Synergy, so that isn't the issue) until I mouse back to the main PC's screens. The button commands for Ctrl+c and ctrl+v work on the xp machine just fine still, so it isn't that the main PC's mouse setup somehow changes when I run CoH on the main PC.
I have 2 CoH accounts - the issues happen on both when using my main PC (with or without the second PC being powered on).
Troubleshooting:
Just for completeness, I want to state that I have run the updater in default non-compatibility and non-administrator modes. UAC is still turned on and does prompt for access when I launch the updater and I grant it access.
I have tried disabling and uninstalling any other installed mouse hardware/software (the Saitek Magic-Mouse for example that would allow me to use my gamepad as a mouse in Windows) to no effect.
I have tried Intellipoint in administrator mode, upon reboot having the exe to launch intellipoint in administrator mode just resets the trackball buttons back to defaults (back and forward for the browser) - so I shut that off and reset my options to not have it launch as administrator
I have tried mouse settings using the "Enable program-specific settings" option in intellipoint...again, no go.
I have tried ingame to use /bind button1 "powexec_name teleport" for buttons 1-8 with absolutely no effect.
Tried running the CoVUpdater and the CoHUpdater in compatibility mode for XP (SP2 and SP3), as well as Vista (without SP and with SP1 and 2) in all compatibility attempts the updater works fine but the CoH loading screen seems to hang indefinitely and never lets me get to a login prompt.
Tried using "run as administrator" for the updater - logged in just fine, but no button passthrough for those two buttons.
Tried the work-around for bypassing the updater and just launching CoH directly (no compatibility or administrator-specifics listed, just the shortcut addon to allow it to run without the updater calling it)...guess what...it works just fine. But I really don't like running the game without going through the updater. (Does it hurt anything to bypass the updater regularly? As long as I launch the updater long enough each day to make sure there aren't any patches then quit out of the updater before launching without the updater? Is it allowed to bypass the updater except in troubleshooting?)
Two last points -
1. This wouldn't be such a huge issue except that over the 5+ years I've been playing I have /always/ used those buttons for recall and teleport. It is a firmly ingrained habit and as such I'm having real difficulties playing a large number of my toons (teleport is my main travel power on probably 50% of my more than 40 toons). I know I could just try to learn different behaviour for teleport and recall, but it's not turning out to be that easy.
2. Something I did about a week ago also caused the passthrough to work - for one gaming session without using the bypass updater option. I had been in about a zillion areas trying to find a fix for the buttons not behaving properly in any application earlier that day though, so I have absolutely no clue what I did that day - but I haven't had to muck with the mouse software to fix the button assignments for any other apps since that day. Without trying things randomly, and rebooting after each to make sure I clear out holdovers from each tweak - I'm just not sure I can get that to happen again. With that, I'm also not sure I remember even half of the combinations of things I might have tried that day...and if it is a long combination of things that got it working that one time, I'm not sure it would be worthwhile to go through a series of hoops to pretend-tweak settings before every play session - at that point it might be easier to just go back to Vista...but I really like Win7 other than this one teeeny issue.
I do not have access to another PC running Win7 presently (we have a second copy, but my husband hasn't upgraded yet). I have a laptop with Vista Home Premium and a desktop with XP sp3, I could probably also use my husband's laptop (also Vista Home Premium though) or his Vista Ultimate 64bit desktop for troubleshooting in a pinch...I think.
If you need specs for the machine I'm running Win7 on I'll provide those as well, but I think for this it shouldn't be needed...given that I can get the desired behaviour on any PC not on Win7, this PC configuration worked with both XP and Vista, and I get it to work if I bypass the updater and those buttons work fine in every other app I've tried them on. (This does not include trying in any other games with button assignments because other than CoH I play primarily puzzle-casual games with no configuration options - or reason for such options - for the mouse.)
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