Hi Eric,
I just received the serial cable and I have 'manually' installed the latest firmware. Things did not change with respect to the USB port. So my Galileo board is nonexistent from the OS point of view. I have also tried to see if the board gets recognized by a 32bit OS (Windows XP) without luck.
I have decided to return the card as it is clear the USB client port is defective. I can confirm that everything else works but the USB client port.
Thanks,
Dragos