[mitey]

I have a problem whereby my HP laptop with the OEM Windows XP SP3 is constantly giving me the 'USB unrecognised' error whenever I plug in a USB device. This afects all 4 USB ports and my USB mouse, Flash Drive and external Hard Drive. All the devices function perfectly on my Windows XP Pro desktop at work.
I have replaced the entire internal hard drive with a brand new item and reinstalled the OEM Windows OS and checked that it is fully updated according to both Microsoft and HP and yet I still have this problem.
When I plug in a USB device and then try to 'add new hardware' it does not recognise that a USB device is connected to the PC.
Coincedently, this error appeared on my Vista SP1 HP desktop also at around the same time and I had to re-install the OS there as well, this appears at this stage to of fixed that problem.
I am convinced that neither of the USB devices are at fault as they work elsewhere and the chances of all 4 USB ports failing at the same time on the laptop is very slim so I am left with a software/config issue.
All device drivers are current and Windows is 'not able to find a better match'.
I have disabled 'allow this device to bring out of sleep mode' for all the USB ports.

I made no changes to the PC to create this issue it just started one day.

Any one have any ideas?