USB drives not working - driver scan shows various drivers need to be updated

[perplexed_1]

Hi all I have a Media Centre PC a1550a.  It has 3 USB slots on the front and 3 on the back of the PC. The back ones work but the front ones don't.  They recognise USB drives when they are inserted i.e. they will indicate I have inserted a Cruzer drive for instance, but then the Welcome to the Found New Hardware Wizard pops up.  It is unable to detect the correct drivers from either install option it presents ie. automatically or by letting me choose the location.  When the Hardware Wizard runs it tries to detect a USB composite device.  It looks as if it is trying to open a folder and starting to transfer information/files but then I get a message indicating the hardware cannot be installed.

The device manager has a yellow question mark against  Other devices - USB device.  I have tried right clicking and uninstalling but this does not work.  I have run a variety of driver check programs on the PC and they show that the following drivers need updating:

ATI SMBus, ATI IDE Controller, Standard Dual Channel PC IDE Controller (this is repeated twice on a number of the driver checks I've done).

I've trawled the internet trying to find these drivers.  I have been unable to find the correct ones, including at the ATI technologies site.  I'm really not sure what I'm looking for there. 

There's a number of programs which I've tried which detect the outdated drivers and then want me to pay a fee for downloading and installing the driver updates.  Do I need to do this or are the drivers available on the HP site or elsewhere free?  If I do need to pay, suggestions about the best driver update sites and driver detectionssoftware would be appreciate.

The PC also has a number of photo slots on the front panel all of which work perfectly.

Thanks all for your advice.

Anne

[erico]

Your ECS RC410-M motherboard has the ATI Express 200 chipset.

The drivers you need will depend on your Operating System.

Please post what your OS is and we can go on from there to locate the drivers.

Before you install new chipset drivers --> try what HP has for solutions to the USB problem first.  The hyperlink goes to an HP webpage for troubleshooting for your PC.

Do yourself a favor and uninstall all of those driver agent and so forth programs. Be advised that some of those programs can harbor trojans, thereby they are not all nice programs. 

[perplexed_1]

Thanks for the response.  I use Win XP.

Re trying the solutions you provided the link to, I tried these but end up with the same new hardware wizard running and the wizard is unable to detect the appropriate drivers on the system.  I don't have install disks for the system as it came preloaded with software. 

Re the driver agent downloads, thanks.  I do download from places like Zdnet and viruscheck the download files prior to running them.  I have uninstalled and run my virus etc checker.

Anne

[TheOldMan]

I suspect that the drivers are not the issue but a hardware failure or noise on the wires that lead to the front USB ports.  I do not see  where you mention doing anything to disturb the internals of your computer, but have you had the case open?  It could also be a problem on the front ports, since you are prone to  use them, that they have been damaged by a static shock.  It is more likely to happen in the winter months because of lower humidity in our homes during the heating season.  If either of these is the reason for your problem, then more than not, you will probably need to resort to using a USB hub to bring USB ports out from the back.  Another possible solution would be to install something like this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815104225

Where, if the motherboard ports are still good, this will give you a usable front port.  This will not help if the motherboard ports got knocked out due to static discharge, however.  Then you need a hub like this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817394056

and plug it into one of the working rear ports.

[Mister_Do]

Hi Anne,

It sounds like your chipset and/or OS drivers need updated. When did this problem start occurring? Did it happen after installing software, running an update, adding hardware?

If you know when it occurred, you can try running Windows System Restore to set your PC software back to how it was running before whatever happened.

If System Restore doesn't work, try the following:

• Go to www.windowsupdate.com. Scan for updates, and install required updates (You don't need to install optional updates unless you see one that sounds related to a problem your PC has.).
• If windows update doesn't work, try reinstalling your original chipset driver. Here is a link to the chipset driver for your PC:

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareDownloadIndex?softwareitem=ob-40486-1&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&...

Note: After installing the original chipset driver, you should re-run Windows Update.

Let us know how it goes.

[perplexed_1]

Thanks for the advice.  I had tried system restore but it didn't work.  There were only a number of points set and when I tried to roll back pre the date I realised there was a problem, it wouldn't accept the restore.  However, strangely now I find that some USB sticks work ona couple of the ports.  None seem to work on the port which is on the top of the panel next to the media card slots, but they work on the two ports that sit up behind the slide down cover below the mdia ports. 

Not all of the sticks I've tried work there now.  Odd and any help about this would be appreciated.  With the two sticks that don't work, they are recognised as new hardware and the new hardware wizard tries to run without success.

In any case thanks for your assistance.

Annie

[mancy_techno]

Hi,

You would have to follow certain things while installing USB drivers in your PC.

First, you would have to define your HP USB model.

After that, define your Operating system so as to install your HP USB device model.

Finally, browse and find the USB driver and install it in your PC.

With the help of RadarSync you could automatically update your driver.

Get more information to fix HP Laptop USB Drivers problems :

http://supportforhp.iyogi.com/laptop-usb-drivers.html

http://welcome.hp.com/country/us/en/support.html

Hope this informaiton helps you otherwise let me know back.