Dell XPS 8920 SSD (Dual Boot)

I am EXACTLY in the same boat, same problem. Need help too.

There must be a solution to this, even using a DVD or USB stick, the keyboard and mouse are dead.

Just found by going to dell.com, support, drivers for the 8920 and OS choice, that the XPS 8920 DOES NOT support Windows 7. Horrible thing to find. If you try to install it with a regular disk or USB, it will disable the USB ports as the normal Windows 7 installation media does not have the USB drivers for that USB chipset. That is why your keyboard and mouse freezes when you try. Dell might have a Windows 7 OEM more recent version for UEFI and that has the drivers, but I doubt they will give access to it since they already labeled the system as incompatible. Sorry for the bad news.

I am trying to have a dual boot windows 10 system. Has anyone successfully managed to set one up.  I am struggling at installing windows on a new hdd. Do I have disconnect the m,2 from the motherboard?

If anyone needs to install Windows 7 on xps8920 see how I solved it

I put the HD in another 64bit machine I installed windows 7 in it and installed a network card pcie

I installed and configured TeamViewer to start automatically

Then I went back to HD for Dell and also installed the network card

With this, the machine connected and accessed the network with the PCIe card

I accessed through another machine by the teamviewer and installed the USB drivers (DriverEasy)

Ready Keyboard and mouse running

I hope I have helped

Buy a PCIe USB 2.0 card and plug all your USB devices into it until you have installed Win 7 and updated the drivers

Cybernet Pinda, how'd you get the network card pcie driver to work in the xps8920?

and can you get us the link to the drivers you installed on (DriverEasy)?

we could possibly slipstream the drivers in the win7 disc.

i make images, so as long as i make one, i can continue to use them.

was this on a NVME SSD?

Is there another way?

How did you solve it?

Could you install windows 7 on the XPS 8920? I have the same problem, I did not find any solution, the applications that the CLP controls only runs on windows 7

How did you solve it?

There was something called Deploy back in the day from Microsoft. Deploy was a utility that allowed manufacturers to put one image of an installed OS on many computers. What this did was speed up the amount of time it took to prep the computer for sale because it only takes 2 minutes to put an image on a computer instead of half an hour installing the OS from scratch. So, what this means is that if you can get this utility, all you need to do is install Windows 7 on any computer and then use the Deploy utility on the 8920.

The problem is that MS doesn't do this anymore but Macrium Reflect Home edition has a feature called ReDeploy which does the same thing and it apparently works. I have not actually tried it out but I am trying to lend ideas since I too need to install Windows 7 Pro onto my 8920. Actually, Dell claims this computer IS compatible but when I asked them about the drivers, they said I have to talk to Microsoft.

Anyway, there is another way that doesn't require ReDeploy. That is to inject USB3.0 drivers for the current chipset into the ISO. This is also known as slipstream. Just look up how to slipstream USB3.0 drivers into the Windows 7 Installation disc.

Here's one link to it but there might be a better one somewhere else:

codeabitwiser.com/.../

Good luck guys. I would try to Run Windows 10 instead because you'll have less of a headache dealing with drivers and troubleshooting when something goes awry.

The only other solution which I have yet to try is to run Windows 7 in VirtualBox. Personally, I want to run Windows 7 only because I'm trying to replace a studio computer that I used to have with MOTU equipment for music production. In Windows 10, I don't know if it's the updates but the computer won't run reliably with the MOTU gear even though it ran fine in an Inspiron 620 before. Also, the Start button, Cortana, Edge, and the Settings button on the bottom right don't work or stopped working at some point during the installation or while using the computer. I did a fresh install and Cortana changed to a white color for no apparent reason. So for that matter, I can't stand Windows 10. It's just not a stable operating system whatsoever on a lot of computers.

So, in a nutshell. The options I'm suggesting are ReDeploy and Slipstream USB 3.0 drivers. Other than that...there is NOTHING else you can do other than actually the aforementioned suggestion as posted by another user.

EDIT DEC-2017

Even if you were able to Install W7, there are no drivers for the computer except maybe the USB controller and video card. You'd have a crippled system because you'd have to install the generic drivers for everything else.

The issue you're going to face is that while this gets Windows 7 running on the otherwise unsupported hardware,  you'll then need to manually install all updates -- since WIndows update is blocked on the Kaby Lake (and Coffee Lake and AMD Ryzen) platforms.

support.microsoft.com/.../the-processor-is-not-supported-together-with-the-windows-version-that

Beyond that, Windows 7 has just 24 months of life left in it before, as with XP, all updates cease.

There are hacks out there to let you do the Windows updates.

Who uses a computer more than a year or two before moving on?

Anyhow, the USB hack I posted above only works until AFTER the operating system is installed.

Then the keyboard stops working AGAIN.

There is a hack out there for that too, but I'm done fighting with it for the day.