More upload problems

Question

My camera Vivitar 8400did upload a gouple of times and now wont. Tried all previous tips. Read now that Windows Vista is nor compatable with ulead explorer which I used to import as Windows would not import before. So I downloaded Picasa which is a great editing suite but still cant upload. Cant find camera. Have tried uploading driver from cd which vivitar said was not needed for XP ect. So what do I need device wise to get usb to connect?
I dialed the spanner and set to usb computer on the dial. I have come to a fullstop,