[HELP] Problems when playing games

Whenever I try to play a game, whether it is World of Warcraft or the basic built-in Chess game (hell, it even happens with Skype sometimes), I get a very weird problem. Everytime I click with my mouse, it is as if it clicks on the application that is running 'behind' the current game.

For example, I usually play WoW in windowed mode, but when I try to click on one of the skills my screen flashes and I get a glimpse of my desktop background and it is as if I never clicked on the skill to begin with. What is weird though is that when I initiate Full screen mode and go back to Windowed mode the problem is gone.

Does anyone have any ideas what it could be?

try running the game and apps in admin promoted mode (right click and run as admin) this usually fixes that, although I know sometimes its related to aero glitch or gadget bars... try run in aero basic and disable gadget bar if problem is annoying, again you can add this automatic switch into the compatibility launch

Disabling Aero was the only thing that worked, but it works sporadically. Is there no other way to fix this?

Running a game in windowed mode makes it just like any other window from which the focus can be stolen by other windows. Use Alt-Enter to toggle the game full-screen/windowed mode, having it full-screen whenever possible.


As for any visual 'flickerings', updating the video card driver to the latest version as well as getting all the game patches would be a plus.