this is how i solved my problem
Plug in your board and wait for Windows to begin it's driver installation process. After a few moments, the process will fail, despite its best efforts
Click on the Start Menu, and open up the Control Panel.
While in the Control Panel, navigate to System and Security. Next, click on System. Once the System window is up, open the Device Manager.
Look under Ports (COM & LPT). You should see an open port named "Arduino UNO (COMxx)". If there is no COM & LPT section, look under "Other Devices" for "Unknown Device".
Right click on the "Arduino UNO (COmxx)" port and choose the "Update Driver Software" option.
Next, choose the "Browse my computer for Driver software" option.
next select "let me pick from a list of device ".
select "Arduino LLC" from "manufacturer" and pick "arduino uno r3" from "model"
Windows will finish up the driver installation from there.
my laptop was not finding the driver when drivers folder was selected so i followed this method
