This just came up.. However, I don't have a second USB port, and nothing is plugged in to my laptops 1 and only USB port... http://blackevilweredragon.spymac.com/power.JPG

This is a common DELL problem ... what was the USB device that is giving you a problem ?

as i said in my original post, there was NOTHING plugged into the USB port, there was no device.. heck, the window that popped up says it's the second USB port, however, my laptop only has ONE USB port, that's it...

well if you have nothing plugged into your USB port and the balloon just pop's up and there is nothing plugged into your pc card slot's and/or you don't have your external floppy drive plugged in then I would say it's a motherboard issue The powersurge warning mean's that a device that uses the USB port is requiring more than 500 milliamps of current and your USB port cannot support that since you say that there is nothing plugged in (the floppy drive and pc card's are viewed as usb devices in some older laptop's serial devices in other's)it leaves only a motherboard . You could try removing all usb device controller's from the device manager and reboot to see if it will reset ... but I don't think that will work and if you do happen to have to use a USB device then plug it into a powered hub as a work around (to keep the balloon from returning and shutting down the USB port (but that shouldn't work cause you say it happen's without a device) GOOD LUCK !!

Team, Good solution for usb error when booting the computer. Click on START Click on CONTROL PANEL Double-click on the SYSTEM icon Click on the HARDWARE tab Click the DEVICE MANAGER button Click the “+” next to Universal Serial Bus Controllers to expand the selection. Right-click and select PROPERTIES on the Intel® USB UNIVERSAL HOST CONTROLLER (not the USB Root Hub) Click the ADVANCED Tab Check the box that says: “Don’t tell me about USB errors”