Disable touchpad when other pointing device available

[Don Wells]

    I am running Windows 7 Home Premium on an HP Pavilion dv6 Notebook PC.
    I use a Microsoft Trackball Explorer 1.0 as a pointing device.
    Today while in chat mode with HP support I launched System Configuration > Startup, de-selected all programs then selected Microsoft Security Client; clicked on Apply then OK and restarted. Subsequent to this the touchpad was active, and the trackball worked though the keys were in the default configuration, not as I had configured them. I have since reselected all programs in System Configuration > Startup.
    The Mouse Properties panel is set to Disable internal pointing device when external USB pointing device is attached.
    Adding the Mouse to the Startup folder causes the touchpad to be disabled on startup, but leaves the Mouse Properties application open.
    Disconnecting the trackball USB cable causes the touchpad to be enabled (if not already in that state), then disabled on reconnecting the cable But only if the Mouse application has previously been launched during the current Windows session. Closing Mouse is of no consequence.
    I am suspicious that the problem is related to the sequence of devices being activated on startup, but know of no way to control this.

Can anyone offer any advice on this situation?

[StuartR]

Just to check that I have understood the problem correctly.

If you connect your trackball to the laptop then it does correctly disable the touchpad
If you start your laptop with the trackball already connected then it does not disable the touchpad, unless you disconnect and reconnect the trackball.

I wonder if you could affect this by connecting the trackball to a different USB connector.
Are there any BIOS settings that might influence the touchpad configuration?

[Don Wells]

Just to check that I have understood the problem correctly.

If you connect your trackball to the laptop then it does correctly disable the touchpad
If you start your laptop with the trackball already connected then it does not disable the touchpad, unless you disconnect and reconnect the trackball.

I wonder if you could affect this by connecting the trackball to a different USB connector.
Are there any BIOS settings that might influence the touchpad configuration?

Thank you for the response Stuart.

Switching USB ports did not improve the situation.

I need to correct my original post. The touchpad responds to connection of the trackball, only after launching Control Panel > Mouse. Closing Mouse is of no consequence.

I have yet to look into the BIOS.