Disable Touchpad When External Mouse Is Connected

Although the touchpad performs the same functions as an external mouse, including scrolling and highlighting, still Many users prefer to use a USB mouse as a pointing device and disable the touchpad. Most laptops have dedicated shortcuts or buttons to disable touchpad when you plug in an external mouse. However, if needed, you can configure Windows to automatically disable touchpad when the mouse is connected.

Yes If you prefer to use an external USB mouse over a touchpad on a windows 10 laptop you can set to automatically disable the touchpad when a mouse is connected and automatically enable the touchpad when the mouse is disconnected.

Disable Touchpad When External Mouse Is Connected

There are multiple ways you can go to disable the touchpad when the USB mouse is connected. Here are three different ways you can automatically disable a touchpad when an external mouse is connected.

Automatically Disable the touchpad when the mouse is connected via Settings App

• Press Windows + X select settings,
• Go to Devices –> Touchpad.
• On the right, uncheck the option Leave touchpad on when a mouse is connected.
• And the touchpad will be disabled next time you connect an external mouse.

That means, now onwards, anytime you plugin a wired mouse or a Bluetooth dongle for a mouse, the touchpad will automatically switch off.

Automatically Disable the touchpad when mouse is connected Using Control panel

Alternatively, you can use the classic Control Panel app to configure the feature. This is especially useful for Windows 7 users.

1. Open the classic Control Panel app.
2. Go to Hardware and sound and click on the Mouse link below the Devices and Printers item.
3. This will open the mouse properties window.
4. Move to the Device Settings tab (ELAN)
5. And check the “Disable when external pointing device plugin” option.
6. Click Apply and then OK.

Tweak registry to Automatically Disable touchpad when mouse is connected

Also, You can tweak the windows registry editor to automatically disable the touchpad when you plugin the external mouse.

1. Press Win + R to open the Run dialog box.
2. Type regedit and press Enter.
3. Go to the following location.HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Synaptics\SynTPEnh
4. On the right panel, select “New -> DWORD (32-bit) Value“.
5. Name the value as “DisableIntPDFeature“.
6. Double-click on the newly created value.
7. Type 33 in the Value data field.
8. Click on the “Ok” button to save changes.

That is all. Restart your system Now onwards whenever you attach an external USB mouse to your laptop, the touchpad automatically gets disabled and automatically enables the touchpad when the mouse is disconnected.

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