usb flash drive and usb external hard drive are not recognised

I have a new acquired hp dv9223tx notebook

my problem is that my usb flash drive and usb external hard drive both are not installing properly
vista asks for drivers which on its device manager says are not required for them to operate.
i tried pointing the instal drivers from c:windows/system32 folder so far nothing
but all other usb devices work fine
my wireless mouse , keyboard all but not these two

they appear on "other devices" in device manager as mass storage and usb to ide with an exclamation mark but cannot see them on "my computer"

tried hp site, vista and all nook and corner

please help with your suggestion

 

btw i have also formatted my usb flash drive as suggested in mircosoft forum

 

finally i have found the solution to my woes and 100 others

the culprit is
%SystemRoot%\inf\usbstor.inf
%SystemRoot%\inf\usbstor.PNF

these files were missing........
once I downloaded and copied the inf file into the folder "c:\windows\inf\" , it created the pnf file

when plugged my usb and external hard drive
vista asks for driver so i directed it to directory
and everything fell into place now vista recognises both of them

hope this helps others with similair problem

thanks for nothing bill gates thanks for takin up 3 days of my life on this f**kin issue

keep me posted guys

 

The same thing happened for my flash drive, so I tried plugging it into a different USB slot, and it installed without any problems.

 

This worked with my HP Pavilion Notebook dv9291ea and a CipherWave external USB drive that Vista kept asking for manuf's driver disk - with thanks to Seagate article (linked below):
Start by running Computer Management -> Device Manager:

If the drivers are not loaded properly: The drivers for the drive are included as part of Vista and normally load automatically, but occasionally the drivers will need to be loaded manually. To load the drivers manually:

1. Click the + box next to Other devices
2. Double-click the drive (usually listed as USB Mass Storage, but may be listed under another name).
3. A new Windows will open showing properties; click the Reinstall driver button.
4. This will open the update driver software wizard, click "Locate and install driver software (recommended)".
5. Then click "Browse my computer for driver software".
6. Click Browse.
7. Open the Windows folder on the C: drive (Computer > C: > Windows) and click OK.
8. Make sure the "Include subfolders" box is checked.
9. Click Next. This should load the drivers.

Be patient, after loading the first driver it asked for two more, so repeat 4-9 for each. Worked beautifully there after.

Here's the link to the full Seagate article that comes with pictures.

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.jsp?locale=en-US&name=ext-ts-vista&vgnextoid=694d8b0e50e73110VgnVCM100000f5ee0a0aRCRD