When my laptop goes into standby mode the wireless keyboard and mouse do not work when the computer is restored. This does not happen if I restore the computer from the first standby mode (i.e. tapping the track pad to “wake” the computer), but the problem does occur when I need to press the Power button to wake the computer from a deeper standby. If I reinsert the wireless mouse and keyboard dongle into the computer following the restoration from standby I can get the mouse to work, but the keyboard still does not work. How can I fix this problem, so that both the keyboard and mouse work following restoration from standby mode?

It seems that your mouse and keyboard work correctly when the computer is restored by standby mode, as this is a low-power state the computer enters after a period of inactivity. However, even in standby state, the computer does still respond to particular inputs (such as pressing a key on the keyboard, or touching the track pad) to wake the computer out of standby. From your description of the problem, it seems that the mouse and keyboard work correctly when the computer is resumed from standby. However, when the computer is completely powered-down into a hibernation state, which requires the power button to be pressed to wake the computer, the mouse and keyboard do not work correctly. Therefore, we need to focus our attention upon getting the computer to work properly when resumed from hibernation.

As you may have noticed, the primary difference between standby and hibernation is that standby is a low-power state for the computer, whereas hibernation saves any data located in memory onto the hard drive and then performs a complete power-down on the computer. Windows has been known to experience driver issues when resuming from hibernation mode, particularly relating to not correctly re-loading USB drivers to make attached USB devices work. As a first step towards resolving this problem, make sure your computer is running Windows XP Service Pack 2. Microsoft has reported that several USB issues relating to standby or hibernation mode have been resolved in the service pack, so this may resolve the problems you are also experiencing. Service Pack 2 can be downloaded from Windows Update (windowsupdate.microsoft.com).

Should Windows XP Service Pack 2 not resolve the problem, we should next check whether Windows recognises there is a problem with the keyboard and mouse after restoring from hibernation. Since you are using a laptop computer this makes the process much easier, since you can still use the inbuilt keyboard and track pad to check the computer configuration. Once the computer is restored from standby mode, and the wireless keyboard and mouse are not working, go to the “Start” menu > “Control Panel” and open the “System” control panel (you may need to first select the “Performance and Maintenance” category). In the window that appears, click the “Hardware” tab and the “Device Manager” button. The Device Manager window will appear. This allows you to see the status and properties of all devices which are installed on the computer. We need to look for any device which is not working correctly. These devices should have a yellow exclamation point against the device entry. If there are any devices with a yellow exclamation point check whether these relate to the wireless keyboard and mouse. If so, there is a problem with the device itself and Windows. This will be difficult to diagnose, as there is some conflict occurring when the computer resumes from hibernation. The first step towards resolving this issue will be to check for any updated drivers for the wireless mouse and keyboard. Visit the website for the manufacturer of the equipment, and check whether any updated software or drivers have been released (as often updates will resolve such known issues with the hardware). If no updates are available, try reinstalling the hardware and related software. To do this, unplug the wireless dongle from the laptop and restart the computer. Once the computer has restarted, go into the “Add or Remove Programs” control panel and uninstall the software relating to the wireless mouse and keyboard. Now restart the computer and it should be ready to accept a new installation of the hardware and related software. Find your original documentation and installation CDs for the wireless mouse and keyboard, and then proceed to install the hardware are instructed in the manual. Once this has been completed, check whether the problem continues.

Should the problem continue, there could be some incompatibility between your computer (or the software/hardware configuration of your computer) and the wireless mouse and keyboard. To determine whether this is the case, find another computer (perhaps another computer you may own, or a friend’s computer) and try installing the wireless mouse and keyboard on that computer. Should this work correctly, it seems there is something unique on your computer which disagrees with the wireless mouse and keyboard. This will be quite tricky to track down without sitting in front of the computer, but there are a few generic things we can try to find the conflict.

As a first step, try unplugging all unnecessary hardware from the computer. This will allow us to determine whether the problem is related to a hardware conflict. Hardware which you might unplug from the computer may include printers, external hard drives, etc. After this has been completed, restart the computer and then proceed to put the computer into hibernation mode. Restore the computer from hibernate, and check whether the keyboard and mouse problem persists.

Should the problem continue, we should next investigate potential software conflicts. Before commencing on this aspect, make sure you reconnect any hardware which was disconnected during the previous procedure. Once this has been done, restart the computer. We now need to close any non-essential processes running in the background. As a starting point, close any visible applications which are open, including those in the Windows system tray (i.e. next to the Windows system clock). Once the programs which can be exited have been closed, we now must close any non-visible processes running in the background. Press CTRL-ALT-DEL to open the Windows Task Manager. In the Task Manager window that appears, click the “Processes” tab. This will list all the processes which are currently running on the computer. Click the “User Name” column to sort the processes by user name. If the User Name column is not visible, go to the “View” menu > “Select Columns” > “User Name”. Close any non-essential processes which are running under your user name. You should be able to close most processes except ?explorer.exe? (which is the Windows Graphical User Interface) and ?taskmgr.exe? (the Windows Task Manager process, which you are currently using to close all the other processes). Once the processes have been closed, put the computer into hibernate and check whether the problem persists.

Should the problem not continue, this indicates that one of those processes was causing the problem. In this case, it is now a process of elimination to determine exactly which process was the cause. To do this, restart the computer (so that all the processes reload) and then close one of the processes, and check whether the problem persists. If so, close another process and check again. Continue this process of elimination until the problem stops, at which time you will know the process causing the problem. While this is very cumbersome, it is the most reliable method to determine the process causing the problem.

In the event that closing all processes does not resolve the issue, then the problem does not seem related to any software conflicts. Since we have also eliminated connected hardware conflicts as the issue, this means there could be a conflict or corruption within Windows itself. In this case, you may need to attempt a reinstallation of Windows. Before taking this step, make sure you backup any data which you need to keep, as this process will result in all data on your computer being lost.