USB's being a USBitch

Quick question for you all. Is there any reason why all of my normal USB devices (mouse, headset, most cameras) work fine, all the time, but just about any kind of "mass storage device" won't?
By that, I mean that when I plug them in, I can view what's on the drives, but once I try to do anything to them (copy,paste,open), explorer and any related programs just hang, as it seems it can no longer communicate with whatever I'm working with.
So far this has happened with my Western Digital External HD, a run-of-the-mill USB thumbdrive, and my Sony Cybershot DSC-P100,and because of this problem, I can't use any of them. So far, the Sony is the only digital camera that has given me the same problems as the storage devices.
I'm running XP Pro, with an Intel Pentium 4 2.8GHz, and 1Gb RAM, so of course whenever I try and look for regular USB drivers, everyone always says something to the effect of, "LOL, you don't need drivers, because they're already included in XP, so we won't even bother sharing what you already SHOULD have". If it help, my Mobo's a Shuttle ST61G4.

It's strange, it should work. Especially if you can see them, which means you have the drivers and can fetch sectors from the drive.

Try with the latest drivers for your motherboard? Find out what chipset it has (company and model), and go to VIA/SiS/whoever they made it for the latest.

If you've got a VIA chipset-based motherboard that's your problem right there - VIA stuff is notorious for falling over with USB stuff where there's a significant amount of data going back and forth. If it is VIA-based, try one of these:

1. Install the latest 4-in-1 driver package from VIA (viaarena.com).
2. Switch off any kind of overclocking/performance-enhancing stuff in BIOS. That includes the "optimised chipset" setting in BIOS (set it back to "normal"). You could also try doing the ol' "Load failsafe defaults" thing too.
3. Try installing a dedicated USB card into a PCI slot - if you can't borrow one, they're not too expensive to buy (and it's handy having four or five extra USB sockets without having to use external hubs).