"
I don't think it's a problem with the mouse itself since I plugged in an older one (non-optical) to check, and it did not work."
Is this other mouse you tried still a USB? Or an old serial type, or PS2?
If non-USB, the PS2 "Awareness", or the serial port may be set to OFF in the machines
bios.
Have you visited Gateway and obtained/installed all the latest drivers for your system?
In case, download, install, and run
Everest Home Edition on this machine. (Clean FreeWare) Once it's finished loading and running, click on Report, Report Wizard in the Menu Bar. Save all hardware related pages (the default) to a
TEXT file in a location of your choice. (It will default the location to C:\Program Files\Lavalys\EVEREST Home Edition\Reports.)
Please
Attach that text document to your next posting. (When posting, click on Advanced, and just below the posting box you'll see "Additional Options", and within that, "Attach Files". Click on "Manage Attachments" and follow the prompts. Browse to the file and choose UPLOAD.) Please don't copy/paste the contents into the posting. It makes for a large post, and somewhat disrupts the posting readability.