I need help, please. I can not get my laptop, a Lenovo 3000 N100 running VISTA Home Premium to recognize any thumb drives. The thumb drives work on XP but the VISTA on my laptop can not recognize them. Yes, I have:

Tried all four USB ports
Searched for new software on the internet at the OEM site
(there isn't any)
Yes, other USB devices work but not flash drives
What flash drives you ask? DELL 128, Kingston 2GB, a generic USB
Yes, the flash drives work on my desktop VISTA.
I tried some generic WinTricks Generic USB driver but that didn't do a thing other than aggravate me.

I'm mentally challenged with this thing. No, I don't know how to code, write PERL, PURL or PEARL, open the regedit, change the BIOS or whatever other terms most of the geeky types who lurk here know how to do. In fact, I barely know how to navigate the Internet. I need the solution for brainless and witless types like me, in clear English, void of anything that requires an MS in Computer Science. I am however very handing with a shovel, pick-axe and a chain saw, all of which are very appealing at the moment. I can cut the top off a 40 oz. can of beer with one swipe of a chainsaw and not spill a drop but can not figure this out. In fact, I'm drinking a PBR at the moment while I write this post.

Any help would be most appreciated.

Thanks, Marty

Dude,

The only thing working is my beer consumption. First,my Device Manager does not have a listing for "portable devices". It has one that says "other devices" and thats where the yellow sign with the black exclamation shows up whenever I plug in a thumb drive.

Now the mystery starts to deepen. So whenever I try to find software for the thumb drive (under search automatically) when I click on the "unknown devices" I get this remark that says "WINTRICK GENERIC USB Drive",can't find the specified file.

(Popping open another beer). I'm not all that up on these things but I'm sure that came from the time I installed the generic USB drive software which never did a damn thing other than act like my ex-girlfriend, meaning frustrate the hell out of me every time I tried to fire her up like I'm trying with this USB thing.

So now I have two problems: First I don't know how to remove that damn WINTRICK generic USB drive file/folder which I was able to find inside the Driver Store folder. All of these new commands in VISTA are driving me crazy as well. I know there's all this take ownership etc...but none of the instructions on how to delete a file are in English. If I can't hear it on a CB radio then I don't unner stand it.

Second, still no joy on the USB.

This is enough to make me want to go back to my ATARI 64. Now that was one machine I tell you.

All the flash drives use the same USB Mass Storage driver. There is nothing to install or configure to use a flash drive.
If it's not working I would guess it's a hardware problem with either the flash drive or the computer as it's fairly hard to mess up the USB Mass Storage drivers to my knowledge.
It's still possible though it is a software problem so I suggest you try to boot up with something like Knoppix (A Linux distro that boots from a cd) and see if it can recognize the flash disk.
If it finds the flash disk then it's a Windows problem and if it doesn't then it's quite likely a hardware problem with the computer.
I can list later when I have more time how to actually burn the ISO download to a disc and boot from it if you don't know how to do so.

First do you have a computer with a CD burner and a disc to burn to?