Help, been a muppet, plugged a camera into usb without installing the correct software. What do I do now? The manual suggests re-setting the registry but how do i know which key to reset?

Should still work, just install the software and plug the device back in. BUT use a different USB port till everything is setup, once all done it should be ok to use in any port.

Presumably you plugged it in, it was detected, and you were prompted for a driver but didn't have one? Or did it find a standard driver to use? If the former, just unplug it, install the software, then plug it in again. If the latter, try looking for it in the Device Manager under Control Panel->System and uninstalling it, then proceed as above.

Cheers both, will reply if it's still not working.

I've had this problem before. The software you got with the camera also has updated USB drivers and transfers these to windows as part of the installation. You then plug in your camera and windows detects it and the driver that was added automatically.

If you plug the camera in first without installing the software, sometimes windows installs an earlier driver which is no longer compatible with your device so the device doesn't work but windows thinks it's installed ok. Even if you install the new drivers after this, windows always tries to connect using it's own earlier driver.

The USB device is added in the registry and can be seen in the device manager of the hardware section of 'system' in the 'control panel'. If you go into device manager and then plug-in the camera you will see the location of the camera entry coming up. If you delete it, unplug the camera and then go back and do the installation correctly from scratch then all should be well.