Teach Your Mouse to Stop Waking Your Computer from Sleep

Putting your computer to sleep is a handy way to save electricity and extend the life of your system without shutting it all the way down -- and having to wait for a lengthy boot-up process. Around here, Rick and I routinely use sleep on our computers, though we've argued extensively abot the merits of shutting down completely.

What I find annoying, though, is the fact that a wayward breeze (or wandering cat) can easily disturb the mouse. And as soon as the mouse moves, your computer will wake from sleep.

Well, stop fretting, because I can tell you how to make your mouse stop waking your PC from sleep.

It's actually pretty simple. Here's what you need to do:

1. Open the Control Panel (click Start, and then click Control Panel).
2. In the Control Panel's search box, type mouse and then choose Change mouse settings.
3. Click the Hardware tab, select your mouse, and then click Properties.
4. Click Change settings.
5. Finally, click the Power Management tab and clear the checkbox that says Allow this device to wake the computer.