Bah!

[winneganfake]

Truly, this is one of the days in which technology shall prove to be a complete and total mystery to me.

Especially this damn USB port.
Here's the issue (for any hardware gurus): The port's recognized by the computer, seems to be working fine, but anything plugged into that port isn't recognized by the computer. It'll recognize that something's there, but it won't be able to actually figure out just what I've put in. Gah.

Comments

[crowgod.livejournal.com]

if you can figure this one out, please let me know. I've got two USB ports on the front of my tower, but XP won't recognize when I plug anything in. Am running out of room on the back ports...

[winneganfake.livejournal.com]

Have you tried re-installing XP yet?

(I'm really hoping that isn't the fix for this. I do not want to lose a week to doing backups and then reinstalling.)

[crowgod.livejournal.com]

can't reinstall XP. using a pirated copy. Piracy, argh. 'Course, then I run into problems and have no way to fix them.

First Thing to Try...

[bitobear.livejournal.com]

(Warning: advice given _without_ knowing what device you are trying to use. It's good advice, but your mileage may vary... 8-)

First, if you haven't done it, try plugging the device into the USB ports on the *back* of the computer; the ones near the keyboard port. Those are directly connected to the motherboard. If this works then the wires for the USB ports on the front of your computer might have been kicked loose, mis-installed, or never hooked up. This happens a *lot*. The solution is to open up the box reconnect the wires (consult your manuals or it could get messy... 8-)

Presuming that didn't work...

Plug in the thing you want to use.

Go to your Device Manager [Right-Click "My Computer" click "Properties" when the window opens click the "Hardware" tab, then the first button is "Device Manager"].

You get this little tree of collapsible categories of things like "Disk Drives" and "Keyboards".

Look for "unknown devices" (They have yellow question mark icons). They may be stacked up in a top-level yellow-question-mark line item or you may have to open up [click the little boxes with the pluses in them] the Universal Serial Bus line item.

If you find any of the yellow question-mark icons then you want to right-click on those items and choose uninstall.

After you have gotten rid of all of the question-mark items unplug the device from your USB system.

Then, and only then, if the device came with install disks, use those disks to reinstall the drivers. (This is optional, but I recommend it.) IF the install process tells you to plug in the device at some point, do that.

Otherwise reboot your computer and log back in, and *then* plug in the device. You should get an "adding new hardware" dialog box. If you don't go to Control Panel -> Add New Hardware.

Most USB devices warn you to install the software before you plug in the device for the first time. This is to prevent the computer from installing the "ignore this device" yellow-question-mark driver before the real software is available. A _good_ driver install will remove all the question-mark drivers and start the add-hardware process as part of the install... There aren't a lot of good driver install programs out there... 8-)

Finally, if nothing else works, you can plug in your device and uninstall _*EVERYTHING*_ in the Universal Serial Bus list and then reboot WITHOUT your device plugged in. (sometimes a "real" driver will have stolen the entry for your new device). It will probably make you reboot once or twice to put in all the built-in pieces of the USB system.

Re: First Thing to Try...

[winneganfake.livejournal.com]

Actually, I've gone through that entire list already, with no luck. It's definitely the port, not the devices or drivers. Which means cracking the case probably. Gah......