I have installed Mandrake 10.1 Official and it stops booting up at the - checking hardware line. (only when i have my usb optical mouse plugged in)

While installing 10.1 the mouse did not work either
but was working under winXP fine

An older PS/2 non optical mouse worked fine and the install was able to be completed.
i cant keep on using thismouse so ineed to make the usb one work it isnt faulty as it was
working befor

Any suggestions would be appreciated on fixing this in a easy to understand manner for a relatively new Linux user.

i am of course asuming that my usb is working as ive got my usb adsl router pluged in also
and that apperas to have no problems
Thank you

M/B=ECS K7VZA v3
CPU=AthlonXP2400+
Ram=256MB pc133
Video=Nvidia GeForce FX5200
HD=Hitachi 80GB
OS=Mandrake linux 10.1 KDE3.2 Kernal 2.6.8.1