13 Posts
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14930
inspiron 11 3168 P25T
I made the mistake of buying this laptop, only to find out that the hard drive is so small it's practically unusable. It came with Windows 10, which takes up most of the hard drive. In fact, it takes up so much of it that it doesn't even have enough room for it's own updates!
The laptop has a 1.60 GHz processor, 4GB RAM and a 64-bit OS
Is there anything I can do to this laptop to make it more functional? I have a 50GB USB drive on it and I save everything I can on that, but I'm thinking I need to get rid of Windows 10 and put a smaller OS on it?
nyc10036
5.6K Posts
1
May 21st, 2020 07:00
@kris6868
If you have a 32 GB eMMC hard drive on this, the best thing to do is to do a clean installation of Windows 10.
Then run Check for Updates which will bring Windows 10 up to date.
Then run Disk Cleanup including System Files.
Use your 50GB USB flash drive or a microSD card to store your data files. The programs still should be installed on the hard drive.
I have done this for several HP, Lenovo, Dell laptops that have the 32 GB hard drives. It works!
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nyc10036
5.6K Posts
1
May 28th, 2020 07:00
@kris6868
Having SATA AHCI controller means nothing when it comes to whether you have a 32 GB eMMC hard drive or a traditional hard drive.
As I wrote before, use your service tag # to verify the configuration of your laptop. If it is 32 GB it is eMMC. No need to tear apart your laptop to "look".
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kris6868
13 Posts
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May 26th, 2020 17:00
Now I can't get the Dell OS Recovery program to work. It installed okay and started up but now seems to be stuck at verifying the image. I cancelled it and then restarted by right clicking and running as admin, but it's still stuck on verifying the image. My plan is to let it run overnight, but I'm not hopeful.
ejn63
10 Elder
10 Elder
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23.1K Posts
1
May 27th, 2020 04:00
It isn't. Look at the size of your C: drive. If its 32G, it's eMMC. If it's 500 G or larger, it is a SATA hard drive.
kris6868
13 Posts
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May 27th, 2020 04:00
I just realized that I don't know if this computer has an eMMC drive or a SATA drive! I looked in device manager and all I got is a number we202kd032g e70290fs Why is this information such a big secret?
kris6868
13 Posts
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May 27th, 2020 07:00
Thank you! And I take it that would be true of a 3185 2 in 1 as well?
ejn63
10 Elder
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23.1K Posts
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May 27th, 2020 08:00
That system appears to have been sold in both eMMC and hard drive formats as well, yes.
kris6868
13 Posts
0
May 28th, 2020 06:00
Thank you very much for your help. I need to start a new discussion because I have a 3185 2-in-1 (not a 3168) and was a$$-uming that because it says (in device manager) that it has a standard SATA AHCI controller that it has a SATA hard drive. If I could get the cover off I'd just look inside, but it's stuck by something in the middle and I don't really want to either break it, or reach in there to see if I can release it without watching some more videos to see how it's done.
This is good news though, that it may have a SATA hhd that I can replace with a bigger one. Now to find out what the heck it has in it.....
kris6868
13 Posts
0
May 28th, 2020 07:00
You're right. I finally found it when I pressed F12 on startup and it had the hhd information that actually said eMMC.
I was trying to figure out how to reinstall Windows 10, but haven't yet. If I wasn't learning so much I'd dump this laptop and upgrade to one with a bigger hhd, but this one is actually fast enough for what I do and now that I know that I need to keep it cleaned up I think it'll work.
At this point I'm not even worried about keeping anything on it, so am going to try to reinstall windows again. Thank you for all your help with this. I really appreciate it!
nyc10036
5.6K Posts
1
May 28th, 2020 08:00
@kris6868
Download Media Creation Tool. Use it to create a bootable USB flash drive.
Boot into the USB and select the option to do a brand new installation.
There are Youtube videos on this procedure.
I have done this multiple times on various laptops with the 32 GB eMMC.
kris6868
13 Posts
0
May 28th, 2020 11:00
Same issue, media creation tool just keeps telling me I need 8GB of free space on C:, which isn't going to happen as long as windows is there. I had 5GB at one time, but I'm not sure how I got it and it didn't last long. It usually runs with less than 2GB, but has been down to less than 1GB lately, which is why I decided I needed to do something about it.
I ran disk cleanup with system files selected, and ran "clean now" in storage sense, but only got about 500MB, so now have 1.8GB free.
I don't understand why Dell doesn't have a solution to this problem since it seems to be such a common problem with these 32GB eMMC drives? Or maybe they do and I just can't find it?
I'm going to go see if maybe I can create the usb on another laptop (one with enough space) and then use it on the 32GB one....
nyc10036
5.6K Posts
1
May 28th, 2020 12:00
Creating bootable USB on another PC will definitely work.
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kris6868
13 Posts
0
May 28th, 2020 12:00
It worked!!!!
Not sure why I didn't think it would, but the media creation tool worked just as smoothly as could be on the laptop with enough space on the hhd. Aand then I remembered reading about F12 (or F8) on startup, and booting from the usb, and everything went smoothly from there and now I have a new copy of Windows 10 on my 32GB eMMC drive and it has 8.32GB free space!
And now I know quite a bit more than I did before.
Thank you everyone for your help.
nyc10036
5.6K Posts
0
May 28th, 2020 18:00
Be sure to run Disk Cleaner and select the option System Files. This will clear a couple of GBs off the hard drive.
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Tadichi64
6 Posts
0
May 13th, 2021 07:00
I installed Ubuntu Studio (Linux 64-bit) over the entire Windows 10 installation, a clean install. This computer works perfectly and efficiently with this operating system instead of Windows 10. It came with Libre Office (a free alternative to Microsoft Office), and automatically found and installed every driver this computer uses. Even the touchscreen works, it installed everything without asking me like Windows does. And I have 10gb free to do what I want, which is to have a portable writing laptop as this product was originally intended.
I am typing all of this on my Dell Inspiron 11 3168. I considered this computer a "brick" until I wiped Microsoft off and put on Ubuntu Studio 20.04 LTS.