USB malfunction with Dell D600

Recently got my hands on one of these and it’s a good little machine with wireless broadband and fully updated XP Pro.

A warning bubble keeps appearing in the toolbox saying there has been a USB device malfunction and sometimes it randomly makes the pinging noise as if I’ve plugged a mouse in or something.

Both USB ports work so could this be a bad connection inside the machine or a dry joint on the board somewhere?

Regards
Rick