Win7 on B130?

There is no Upgrade from Any version of XP to windows 7.   That means you will have to format and reinstall everything.

There are no vista drivers for this unit.  This means that you have an unsupported configuration.

Yes I have got this unit to run fine on Windows 7 32 bit. There were two complications, the Video Driver and also Dell Quickset.

For drivers the ones you need are mainly the Vista 32 bit ones from the Inspiron 6400:

• Dell Notebook Software R143625 

• Intel Chipset R140623 

• Video R128346 (XP Driver you need to install via the found new hardware)

• Wireless Card (Depends what one you have, if Intel Proset Wireless get from the Intel Website)

• Touchpad R141200 

• Dell Quickset R180759 (Lengthy procedure to install XP version as Dell didn't make the 1300/6000 compatible for this model).

I have documented the Windows 7 install procedure in my wiki A Clean Install of Windows.

Now if you can get Windows 7 for very cheap or free then it is probably worthwhile doing. If on the otherhand you are paying for a full license, you are best to instead buy a new unit. Standard laptops on the market today vastly outpower the Inspiron 1300 in both performance and battery life and Windows 7 will run much smoother. Note also that you can install Windows 7 without a product key and evaluate it for 3 days, this will also give you a chance to see if you find the upgrade worthwhile.

Additional notes on how to get the Video driver and Quickset working in the Inspiron 1300/6000.

Download the XP video driver and extract with 7zip. In device manager, right click the device with the error and select install/update driver select the specific location and select the folder where you have extracted the driver. (May want to check on WIndows Update also for a Video Driver).

Now install the Inspiron 6000's XP Quickset in compatibility mode.

Also change on the start menu.

Next use task schedular. Start it via a search from the start menu.

Go to actions > Create Basic Task

 

Follow the wizard, Name: Dell Quickset,< Next>  Trigger: When I log on  Action: Start Program select program, navigate to C:\Program Files\Quickset and click on the Quickset Icon. Then click finish. Almost done, at this stage it worked but I got a UAC prompt everytime I powered up.

The next step is to find Dell Quickset in the Task Schedular Library. Double click it and edit its general properties.

Check run with highest privileges. Now go to the triggers tab edit triggers

Change "Specific User" to "Any User" and make sure enabled is checked at the bottom left. Click .

 

Everything should now be fully functional with Windows 7 32 bit on your unit.