no USB ports after an upgrade.

[Liz]

Hi,

Im running hoary, on an athlon 2000+ chip.
my problem is that a few days ago, i did an upgrade and for some reason, 
i now have no usb ports in /dev/..it should show up as /dev/sda1, 2, 
etc, but i have nothing at all. so when i plug in my miniusb external 
storage drive, it doesnt show onmy desktop. theres nothing in /dev to 
see it.

i need to get this running again, as its an easy way for me to transfer 
files from my pc to uni and back again.

any help would be appreciated.

Liz