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Dell XPS 720 Vista to XP
I purchased a Dell XPS 720 With Vista 32-bit on it. I recently installed vista 64-bit onto the system and it worked fine. Until i realizes my headset didnt support 64-bit and i wanted to go back to 32-bit. Well when i tried to do a "Factory default restore" by pressing ctrl and f11 at the dell splash, the command would make the regular beeping noise, but it would load my normal os. I than tried to boot from the Vista 32-bit cd supplied by Dell, but during installation it would freeze at "Completeting Installation".
I than tried to install XP SP3 Pro 32-bit, which is my currently desired OS as vista isnt for me. I tried to boot from the CD and it would crash with a BSOD right after it loaded all the drivers. After much internet searching i believe i need to load some drivers on a floppy drive and press f6 at the initial screen after selecting to boot off cd.
Questions:
1. Is my hunch about requiring special drivers correct. I belive it has to do with the terms "sata and raid" im not exactly sure what they mean.
and if so...
2. What drivers do i need for a dell xps 720 to install xp pro sp3 32-bit.( i'd post my service tag, its just im not sure if its against policy)
stefan_nu
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December 15th, 2008 01:00
Hi, I experienced the same problem with my Studio 1537. I think you're right, the problem should be the SATA drivers. I created an installation cd and integrated the Intel chipset drivers but without any visible success. Integrating the HD drivers failed, because I didn't find the appropirate inf-files for the built in Seagate HD.
Maybe somebody knows where to get the inf-files for the SATA HD?
In the meantime I talked to the Dell support. They told me that this configuration isn't supported because the notebook isn't released for XP. I think it has something to do with the HD settings in the BIOS. I suppose you have to change the settings from "AHCI" to "IDE" but be careful, I suppose this configuration isn't supported by Dell and I don't know what other impacts this may have (I'm still looking for more information about this). I will try it the next days (first I have to backup all my data).
stefan_nu
Davet50
14.4K Posts
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December 15th, 2008 14:00
Have a Floppy drive? Download This File. Run it to extract the files and place the files on the root directory of a Disk, instert the disk when it prompt you to load drivers
dont have floppy? Download this file. run the files to extract them. Slipstream them into your XP disk
Remove any ram over 2 gig at install time.
Davet50
14.4K Posts
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December 15th, 2008 18:00
For Vista I know for a fact the if your disk does not have SP1 in it you must have only two gigs of ram installed. you cannot turn ram off in the bios you must remove it.
I am thinking this is your issue. As for XP it is proably the same. My system came with 2 gigs and XP but i never added the extra ram untill i switched to Vista 64. Even now because I have not gotten around to slipsstreaming SP1 into my Vista disk I must remove the extra 2 untill I get SP1 installed.
Juliandil
3 Posts
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December 15th, 2008 18:00
Ok so this is the deal now. I didnt have a built in floppy drive so i used my usb floppy drive from my laptop, and unziped the SATA drivers from the dell suport website onto it. I pressed F6 and loaded the drive at the beggining of the installation. It worked to format my disc NTFS, but after when windows actually began to install, it asked to load a disc containgin the drivers. It wouldnt recognize that they were on the floppy. So i tried using the same method as the floppy but on a seperate cd. No luck.
I endup up downloading nlite and slipstreaming the drivers above onto an installation of "Windows XP Pro Sp3". This worked all the way up until windows was about to boot for the first time. I got continous blue screen of death/reboots. Right at the windows loading screen.
Was this cause i had 4gigs of ram in my computer? should i have gone into the bios and turned 2 of the gigs off?
Wish i had.
Now it seems as if the only OS i can get working is vista 64-bit. Vista 32-bit wont even install, after the first reboot it crashes, telling me that setup could not complete and for me to restart the installation. I have 2 vista 32-bit discs. One shipped with the pc with no service pack, and one with sp1. Both are consistent with this problem.
Im calling dell tech support, but one of their reps just hung up on me... calling back again :@
Juliandil
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December 15th, 2008 19:00
Ok Davet50, i got a hold of technician and we endup booting from the Windows vista 32-bit cd with no sp1 sent to me from dell . We deleted the Recovery partition and installed on the unallocated space. We didn't click new* which was weird.
And vista installed fine :S. For some reason my partitions were labeled incorrectly. My recovery partition was labeled as "Disk 0 Partion 2" and my main OS partition wa slabeled at "Disk 0 Partion 3" no partions 1 was present.
This was all done while 4 gigs of ram were present. However windows vistsa w/o sp1 is only detectin 2851 mb or something around their of RAM. I know when i install sp1 this will be cleared, and it will show 4.00 gb.
As for my previous problem with XP 32-bit, which i will have to run by my tech teacher tommorow, i think the error may have to do with the inproper labeling of the partions. Once i get my OS back to par, ill install Acronis, make a backup. And get back to playing around.