...I'd put something intelligent here, but my smarts all just drained from my brain just now, apparently... I think gullwhacker is on the right track, in fact he's offering what I did in my e-mail, too. Often you just need a minor thing to get the Mac to recognize things you hook up to it. When all else fails, check out Apple Support for help. I often check the forums to find ways of fixing my problems.

(It might be worth taking the time to get them installed to the laptop just in case this incident occurs again.)