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Dimension 8250 rebuild
Hi Everyone
Sorry if this question has been asked before or if it is in the wrong catogary, but I need help rebuilding my D8250.
History is that the hard disk was playing up and within hours of bcking up my data, crashed.
It was a Hitachi deskstar 120gd and has been replaced with a maxtor 160gb (same speed etc).
I can/and have sucessfully reloaded Windows XP with SP1 from original installation cd (several times), but that is as far as I can get.
What I would like (if possible) a complete idiot's guide to reinstalling back to factory setting (as I said, disk crash) from after the XP install.
Reason is I have tried to several times following the guides from other members and from the support site (ie update chipset first etc etc) but still no joy with anything.
As far as I know I have all the original cd's possibly with the exception to the application cd for the sound card (I think the service engineer took it when the original card was replaced while the system was under warranty). Sound card is a creative soundblaster audigy 2, I have been to creative web page but there are so many application programs to download I got confused and wasn't sure which ones I needed so bought an application cd from ebay (should arrive in a day or two).
Any assistance would be gratefully received. I do not mind chatting by phone (landline preferred) or by phone or skype should anyone out there be willing to help.
Many thanks in advance
David
ps just been to add some tags, completely flumoxed by the quantity, hope the ones I added help someone to find me :emotion-5:
Hanspuppa
799 Posts
1
February 5th, 2009 13:00
Hello dunderwd, If you go to the Dell site and enter your service tag number in the search box, you can find the drivers you need for your system.
I would look in the Control Panel on your system and see which devices are in need of drivers, write the numbers (models) down, and then only download and install those drivers.
Hope this helps.
shesagordie
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46K Posts
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February 5th, 2009 13:00
dunderwd
If the Sound card was installed by Dell, you may find the driver HERE
What kind of problems are you having reinstalling XP, as they are not listed in your post?
Did you set the IDE hard drive's jumpers to the 'Cable Select' setting?
Check out the following procedures and see if they can help:
Disconnect all the peripherals from the system except the keyboard, mouse and monitor.
How to configure a Dell Dimension series system to boot to the CD or DVD drive.
This XP reinstallation guide is excellent, or you can use Dell's XP Restallation Guide here.
While installing, remember to delete all existing partitions when you are prompted, then recreate the partitions and format the hard drive, following by installing XP.
After installing XP, you need to install the drivers and applications in the correct order, see here
Followed by installing the Anti Virus utility, updating the definitions, then all the critical Microsoft updates.
Bev.
Hanspuppa
799 Posts
1
February 5th, 2009 16:00
Hello dunderwd, HERE is a link to the Dell site for the drivers for your system.
As I mentioned earlier, you need to determine the hardware in your system, since it can be configured with different components.
An example is it shows an ATI driver and an Nvidia driver. You must know which video card your system has in oder to install the correct driver.
The flicker is probably caused by not having the correct video driver installed. Ths sound card should be easy to determine.
All the yellow marks indicate that the drivers for these devices are not installed.
Write these down and go to the Dell site and download and install these drivers and you will have the system back as you want it to be.
Be sure you locate the chipset drivers and install those first.
Hope this helps.
dunderwd
5 Posts
1
February 5th, 2009 17:00
Hi Hanspuppa, Thanks for your "oops" 2nd reply.
As previously said, I have installed OS several times due to driver problems that I have downloaded in sequence from the web page your link takes me to.
With regard to the sound card I know it is a Creative Audigy 2 as it was replaced some time ago by a Dell service engineer and I also removed it to obtain the part number and looked it up on the creative website for the install/application cd (too many apps, so app.cd on ebay).
I will be trying again tomorrow evening (but won't hold my breath) carefully following links and advice already gratefully received.
Will post again with results.
Many thanks, David
dunderwd
5 Posts
1
February 15th, 2009 03:00
Finally got somewhere, all the hardware is recognised and the system is up and running - but what a palava.
Don't ask how as I couldn't tell you, but some of the drivers were not where I thought they were and not the one I thought they shoulld be.
I got round it by trial and error as I couldn't list the original drivers due to disk crash.
My only problem now is still the screen flicker when it refreshes, I may try and load the drivers from the FP1800 monitor cd and hope I don't muck it up as I have applied all service packs to XP, Office professional and antivirus (that in itself takes long enough so I have burnt all the downloads to CD - just in case) ...
... and of course the sound card, having removed it to get the model and serial number I think I need to go back to Creative website and search carefully for the application programs. The app/driver cd I bought does not recognise the sound card even though both say they are Audgy 2.
(must be a bit like buying spares for a car, your model was built in june and the design changed in july so don't fit) - unfortunatly you can't just drag and drop the Creative folder from my backup (Program Files) onto the new hard drive.
My thanks to Hanspuppa and shesagordie for your help.
(hope this dosn't get deleted for mentioning your user names)
Regards, David
shesagordie
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February 15th, 2009 11:00
dunderwd
Happy to hear that you have the 8250 running again.
The post should not be deleted, because the member names are mentioned. :emotion-17:
Bev.