mouse cursor invisible - machine dependent

[WKjun]

Hi,

I use UVNC on all of my PCs (Windows 10 x64 22H2 based) and in the past there was never an issue with the mouse cursor being invisible.
Some of them have been upgraded from older versions over time, but some have been reinstalled lately.

UVNC is being updated (reinstalled) often, but not every release and asap. So I have no clue when it really started.

Suddenly the mouse cursor was not visible anymore on the newly installed machines while controlling them with UVNC Viewer.
Playing around with Viewer and Server settings was no good.

Fact is, it has to do with either Windows' own Remote Desktop feature, or the Ease of Access mouse setting "Control your mouse with a keypad" - a setting I found elsewhere to solve the issue. But this has never been enabled on the older machines.

Regarding Remote Desktop, I found out that the cursor becomes visible in UVNC Viewer if I connect via MSTSC first and then switch to UVNC. After a reboot, it is invisible again.

This is a viable workaround but I would love to find the actual reason for this behaviour.

Any suggestion is appreciated!

[Rudi De Vos]

Headless system ?

[WKjun]

No, monitors are connected all the time.

[WKjun]

I have redone my bootable USB stick and reinstalled latest Win10 22H2 on that machine.
Same effect, the cursor is gone, except when connecting via remote desktop / MSTSC and take over the session.

I have disabled most of my unattended setup routines, just UVNC and setting an IP-address. Not even Radeon graphics drivers are installed.
A few (quality of life) settings using NTlite are changed, though.

I could test 2 more things, like reinstalling Windows on a machine that is working now, or a clean Windows install without NTlite. Maybe I find the time.

[WKjun]

Interesting findings:

It is - sort of - machine dependent!
I took the harddisk from the "non-working PC" and installed it in a "working PC" where the cursor was visible all the time.
Both are pretty similar: Ryzen 1600 (B350) & Ryzen 2600X (X470), both with Radeon RX 590.

Originally I wanted to freshly install from the same USB stick as yesterday, but accidently booted up Windows.
After connecting via UVNC, the cursor was actually visible!
Putting it back into the non-working PC, the cursor was gone again, as if Track remote cursor locally doesn't work there.

The next thing is, on the non-working PC, if I connect via view-only, the (local) cursor is visible!

(Sidenote: In view-only mode, the cursor animation is perfectly smooth, where in regular VNC mode it is a tad choppy.)

[WKjun]

Logs rule!

I've compared the entries from both machines, and the most obvious difference is this on the non-working PC:

vncencoderCursor.cpp : cursor handle is NULL.


PS:

It seems to have your home paths hardcoded in it: "C:\Users\rudi\Desktop\git_ultravnc\winvnc\winvnc\..."

And some of these can be found here and there on both sides:
--The system cannot find the file specified.
--The specified module could not be found.

[Rudi De Vos]

Thanks for the info,

We also got another cursor issue, cursor is invisible ( Let remote server deal woth cursor)
With Windows Version 1603 LTSB, everything is OK
The error has only occurred since version 1809 LTSC (Headless-Mode)

The view only mode working and not infull... that's something to investigaten thanks

Possible cause found on the net.

GetCursorInfo" returns success but the HANDLE to the cursor is NULL
I am connecting to my Intel NUC remotely and therefore don't have a physical mouse connected. This appears to cause the problem. As soon as I connect a physical mouse everything works as intended again.

Windows seems to be switching to tablet mode once there is no mouse connected and therefore hides the cursor.

[WKjun]

THANK YOU - THAT'S IT!

I didn't realize that I have not connected a mouse to that non-working PC; inputs are needed just occasionally.

And maybe I misunderstood the term "headless system", focusing on the output side, like the connected display and uvnc settings.
I mean, it is so logical, comparable things occur with no monitor connected...

Anyways, I don't need a "fix" for that.
Sorry for taking your time - hopefully not so long as I have invested here.