This particular issue/event I talked about has nothing to do with mouse drivers directly. I do not know if it's generally available, but at least in my case if there is no pointing device attached to the Windows 8 computer at any time, a pointer won't be displayed. The pointer is displayed as soon as any pointing device is connected to the PC. While it is reasonable to automatically hide the pointer if no pointing device is attached, I never encountered this particular situation before, and that's why I didn't immediately realise why there was no pointer on the screen of the remotely controlled PC. I think that if this is a feature and not a bug, the OS should inform the user when it hides the pointer.
Sorry, AFAIK a pointing device in this case is a Mouse or a Digi Pen if you use an Digitizer Tablet. Waht you're talking about has directly to do with the related driver, just depend which Pointing Device you had set up on that Server. Even if that Computer you remotely control isn't a real server, while using Famatech's RAdmin, those computer is classified as server and you had to install RAdmin Server Software on that computer. I had not used RAdmin on Windows 8 yet because all machines I need to remotely control are using Windows 7 till now. May I'll do an test install tomorrow on an Windows 8 Machine and look I get the same problem. Will let you know the outcome.
Ok... What does all this have to do with what I said? Yeah, the remotely controlled computer, which I have physical access to (because it's in my room), is called a server because it accepts incoming connections from clients. But seriously, I mentioned Radmin just as part of the story, not of the problem. You can completely disregard Radmin from this scenario and understand just this: my Windows 8 computer doesn't display a pointer (cursor) unless a pointing device (mouse/pen) is connected to it. If there is no pointing device connected to a Win8 PC, there is no cursors displayed. As soon as you connected a pointing device, the pointer is being displayed immediately and automatically. Don't know if I can explain this in a simpler way. You obviously read this entire thread the wrong way. This is not about remote controlling software, it's just a heads up regarding causes of vanishing pointers. But to answer your questions, 1) Windows RDP lacks a dozen features Radmin has, 2) Radmin doesn't require a physically plugged in pointing device (that what I was saying: I was controlling the Windows8 computer through Radmin and realised that the Win8 PC didn't display a pointer after I ended the Radmin session because there was no pointing device connected to it, but Radmin wasn't the cause...).
The temporary Mouse or Pointing device driver will automatically disabled if the the physical device isn't connected. It there is an permanent Pointing Device Driver installed, there shouldn't be a problem. That applies to RAdmin and other Remote Apps as well. If you remotely connected to an other computer, that other computer will not work with the hardware of the Viewer Computer directly. It will works if there're permanent Drivers are installed. To get those pointer displayed, those driver is needed.
You're getting way off track here. Now, on topic: If you really need a mouse cursor, wouldn't enabling MouseKeys display a cursor even without a pointing device attached?
I can not stretch this enough: in my case it has nothing to do with device drivers. If I simply unplug the mouse from the Windows 8 machine, the pointer is gone (and it doesn't get displayed regardless of controlling the machine through Radmin or InputDirector). When the mouse is plugged back, the pointer shows again.
The only things needed is an working driver! Maybe MouseKey will do the job?! I don't know that software, I know RAdmin quite well after more that 10 years of using and I've more than 400 Licenses running for RAdmin.\ As I wrote before, I'll test tomorrow with Windows 8 and see I get the same problem.
MouseKeys isn't another software, it's the Windows accessibility feature that lets you emulate a mouse with the numerical keypad.
There is no temporary driver involved. I do have a mouse driver installed, but the pointer is showing only if it is connected. I haven't tried it because keeping a wireless mouse receiver connected doesn't bother me, but I will try. I created this thread because I wanted to let people know that a pointer may become invisible in the rare circumstances where they do not have a pointing device connected to a Windows 8 system.
Wow, this is two threads in a row where there are people who decidedly miss the point of your posts. For my part, thank you for this informative post.
I ran into this exact same issue with a computer I have hooked up to my TV, which I control using my phone (same issue with two different Android "remote" applications: Gmote and Desktop Remote). As soon as I was done configuring the new Win8 install, I removed the USB mouse, and the cursor disappeared. As with your experience, the system still responded to cursor input from my remote program, but since the remote applications turn my phone screen into a blank touchpad, I had no way of knowing where my input was except for context highlighting! After reading the OP, I went and grabbed an old Logitech RF receiver I had lying around, and SUCCESS! It's a shame those other two commentors got so off track, as your initial post was spot on. I hope, but doubt, that Microsoft recognizes this use case, and at least adds an option to restore the cursor.
And FYI, I also tried enabling Mouse Keys, and the disappearing cursor behavior remained when I unplugged the RF receiver.