My iPod nano 5th generation won't work on my windows 8.1 laptop,help?

Ok last year I got my first Toshiba laptop for Christmas and had my iPod nano since 2010. The iPod was fittied in perfectly when I first got the laptop and there was no problem with it until a few days ago it wasnt able to recognize the device at all. I tried uninstalling iTunes, turning off the laptop and putting the ipod in plus taking it out god knows how much, it still wouldn't recognize the device! Ive never seen it to fail although we have an old Windows XP computer and there was no problem regonizing it but I prefer to have the iPod on my own laptop computer so I can install purchases easily! Can somebody please tell me how to solve this problem?!