Wireless 1450 802.11a/b/g WLAN driver for Precision M60

Thanks Jim, I got it and it works!

Would you happen to know how to find my last driver I'm missing - it's "USB device" and I don't even know what could it be, nothing is attached to computer right now thruogh USB port. But Universal Bus Controllers seem to work properly.

Best regards,

Ben

 

Did you reinstall XP on the system? If you did, one of the missing pieces may be the "Intel Mobile Chipset" drivers. Chipset drivers are the first thing that should be reinstalled after an OS reinstall, since they define the motherboard configuration. Here's the complete list of XP drivers for the M60. Strangely, Dell doesn't seem to have the XP reinstall guides for the M60 available for download, or I would have posted a link to them as well.

Jim

Dear Jim,

Thank you, I did install "Intel Mobile Chipset", I probably needed it, but when I go to Device Manager I still see a quastion mark next to "USB device"

I don't know what could it be.

You are right - I did reinstall Widnows XP because I couldn't make ma graphic card (nVidia Quadro FX Go700) work properly. I had some bloury efects with graphics and text was not as good as it should be. After installation Windows and the graphic card driver again I don't have bloury efects but when I change the resolution to 1280 x 800 (with higher resolution letters are to small) the text is not as clear as on any machine I had before in my life. I cannot believe it, since this is supposed to be a very good machine.

Is there a big difference between nVidia Quadro FX Go700 that I have in my machine and ATI Mobility Radeon 9600PRO that my friend has in his Inspiron 8600? And is there any solution to make it better, because for me proper visibility is very important for my eyes.

So, as you can see I have to problems with this machine -
1) "USB device" is still missing a driver and
2) nVidia Quadro FX Go700 graphic card ... may just require special settings ...

Best regards,

Ben

If the chipset driver's installed, I don't know what the missing USB device could be.

After installation Windows and the graphic card driver again I don't have bloury efects but when I change the resolution to 1280 x 800 (with higher resolution letters are to small) the text is not as clear as on any machine I had before in my life.

It looks like the native resolution of the WUXGA display on the M60 is 1920x1200. Unfortunately on any flat-panel display, if the resolution settings in the video adapter don't match the device's settings, blurry images will result. Try leaving the display resolution settings at the "native" value, and adjust the Windows font size to see if you can produce a more acceptable result.

I don't have any experience with the two available video adapters for the M60, so I can't help you with that.

Jim

Thank you. I tryied solutions presented by you - it helped a bit, I enlarged Windows fonts but I still cannot use resolutions 1920 x 1200 - everything is to small.

"It never ends" - as they say.

I don't understand why Windows XP doesn't realy format the disk. As I informed you I did reinstall OS to clear everything from the disk. But after reinstallation I was very supprised to see my Downloads folder on dysk C. Now, when installed Netscape 7.1 and try to open it, for unknown reason it wouldn't start! What a surprise!

Ben

Ben,

It sounds like you performed an XP "repair reinstall" rather than a "clean reinstall". A clean reinstall will indeed remove all files and directories from the partition you're reinstalling into.

When reinstalling, you must be booted from the CD, and that must be done by changing the boot order in the BIOS so the CD device is first. Here's a good set of notes on performing a clean reinstall. Given the odd problems you're experiencing, it would likely be worthwhile to do a clean reinstall.

(edit) Here's another well-regarded XP clean reinstall guide.

Jim

Message Edited by jimw on 08-08-2004 10:44 AM

Hi Jim,

I will surprise you, I'm sure I did exactly this same way - I did choose to reformat the disk on NTFS partition and I had to cofirm pressing this Enter, C, L and so on buttons ... 

I have done it so many times even before on diferent computers - always this same. So when I realy want to clean the dysk I do 98 and then XP!

Plus, I finaly found CD with drivers for M60 and when I went to this "USB Device" on Device Manager and went to properties and choosed option to update driver - it didn't find one even on CD with oryginal drivers!

Ben

Ben,

That's very surprising! I've seen one other report that sounded similar. Dell Support recommends using the BIOS low-level disk formatter before doing an XP reinstall...and this may be the reason!

Regarding the font size problem - see if the information in this post suggesting changing the DPI settings improves things.

(edit) Does this post from Denny Denham explain the XP formatting mystery?

Jim

Message Edited by jimw on 08-08-2004 05:50 PM

Jim,

Thanks, it helps. I also did again Winows reinstallation, byt this time Win 98 first, and then Winodwos XP. It went much better - it really formated the disk, and "USB Device" mistery was solved. It appered that I did have pluged USB scanner during first reinstallation.  Second time I disconected it and went with no problems.

Regarding font size under nVidia card I did chenged size as instructed on the link you sent me, it helped and it's better now but still I don't like it that much - the contrast is to bright for my eyes. I'd rather stay with Readeon 9600 if I only new .

Ben

Ben,

Having USB devices connected during a reinstall is known to cause problems. Most USB device drivers need to be installed before the device they support is ever connected.

I gather the screen brightness controls don't help the display problem. What's the state of ClearType?

Jim

Ben,

This is more of a question about XP than it is about the hardware. You should have been able to log in to XP Home in using the built-in "administrator" account. It sounds like you did an "upgrade" installation of XP Pro. I'm surprised that the "upgrade" didn't preserve your installed programs. Even if you create another account with the same user name and password as your old one, your documents still belong to the old (deleted) account. You can "take ownership" of the old documents as described here. It's possible to copy settings from the old account (C:\Documents and Settings\(old account, probably listed as an "SID" now) to the new account, once you've "taken ownership" of the directory containing the old account.

I'd suggest moving to the Software/XP board, where you'll find more people that can help with XP issues like this.

Since you apparently didn't reformat C: when you installed XP Pro, I think things can be mostly recovered. It sounds like just the desktop shortcuts are missing. When you post in the Software/XP board, you need to clarify whether C: was reformatted before XP Pro was installed.

Jim

Hi Jim,

I wonder if you can help wiht this, I have a problem wiht Netscape 7.2 and I wonder if you know of any discusssion group like here that I could find some help of how to solve some problems.

Thanks,
B

Hi Ben!

I guess you'd noticed that I look for new posts in Network boards! :smileywink:

Netscape is the AOL-branded version of the Mozilla Suite. Unless the problems are actually unique to Netscape, you'll likely be able to get help from the  MozillaZine Forums, specifically the Mozilla 1.X support board. In the Dell Forums, you could try the " Software/Other Software" board, but there are more posts about Firefox (the stand-alone browser) than about Netscape.

(edit) Added link to local board.

Jim

Message Edited by jimw on 12-29-2004 09:56 PM