USB driver problem with Win98SE

I recently bought an HP Photosmart 8250. After disabling my AV and
firewall, I tried to install it. Software installs to the point where I
am instructed to connect the printer to the USB port. Message "Building
driver information database appears". HP software says "device
detected", "waiting for setup to finish".
However, Windows says it cannot find the driver on either my hard drive
or the HP CD. Eventually, HP software says "Setup failed to complete".
If I let the software finish, it appears, but the hardware device
manager lists the printer as "Other Device" and has the yellow ?. The
8250 does not appear as a printer. Uninstalling and retrying did not
help. I asked HP for a driver, and they referred me to a 180MB download
which just duplicates the software on the CD, and has the same problem.
Now they want me to delete all USB ports from the device manager, and
re-detect and reinstall them. I am very reluctant to do that for fear
of losing all the rest of my peripherals. One other thing: If I click
on "Add a printer" or add hardware in the Control Panel, I get a
"RUNDLL32 has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down" I
don't know if that is related to the printer installation problem or
not. My USB2 hub is an Adaptec card which works fine with my other
peripherals.

Help would be greatly appreciated.

Don Eagle