I received a new laptop with vista home pro,also received a 1ghz flash drive USB ,Vista does not recognize it at all,so tried a couple from various family members,nothing.Is there a software update that can be downloaded to solve this issue?

Thanks for your time

Hi kaysgramma, welcome to BC.
There is an update that resolves multiple USB issues in Vista, including hangs, errors and non-functionality. You can get it here. It'd be the first thing I'd try myself.