Camera/SD card & Vista issues

Vista Home Premium - HP dv6871us Laptop - Nikon CoolPix S1 camera
When the camera (or it's SD card) are hooked up to the laptop via USB or going thru the built-in SD card reader, it shows that it's full with a red bar, but when you go to explore it, the two folders are empty. However, when the camera is hooked up to an XP computer (either USB or SD reader) all the pictures are there and totally visible. I tried using a different SD card on the laptop that I know has pictures on it, and it worked just fine. So, let me summarize to dispel any confusion:
1. Camera/SD card is recognized on Vista laptop, shows as full, but no pictures can be found or seen.
2. Camera/SD card works fine on a different PC running XP.
3. A different SD card with pictures works fine on the Vista laptop and the XP computer.
Anyone have any ideas? In the meantime, I'm going to burn the pics from the camera to a CD on the XP machine, but I'd like to know why it reads on the XP computer and not on the laptop, and why a different SD card works with the laptop....

Thanks.

(There's a time crunch on this, so any help is appreciated!)

 

i have had this same problem (kinda), with some memory cards on my xp laptop, that has the built in media card reader. when i insert certain memory cards into my laptop, it will say they are not formatted, do i want to format it. well, if i take it out and plug the memory card into an external media card reader, it works fine on my laptop.

i haven't figured this one out, i don't know if it's a certain size, speed, brand of memory card, or brand of media card reader? i've had problems with 2 types of memory cards (sd, and whatever sony has).

edit - have you tried to format the card in the vista comp, or xp comp, instead of the camera (or vice/versa)? of course after you get your pics off. - sos