Windows XP Service Pack 3

There haven't been a lot of posts on here about problems with SP3 so I have to assume it should work OK on your PC.  I would disable any anti-virus and malware programs when you install it.   I have no info on an "admin password bug" (if there is such a thing).  I know that on laptops if there is a BIOS password and it's forgotten you have to contact Dell, and be the registered with Dell owner to resolve it, and this is intentional due to the large number of stolen laptops.  An "Admin" password may be the same way.

As far as the Dell supplied "OEM" versions - the ONLY difference between what Dell supplies and what you can buy as a "retail" version is that the Dell version will only install on a Dell PC (it has to see a Dell BIOS).  There are many misconceptions that the Dell Windows install disc is not a full Windows Operating System.

With SOFTWARE support, after the first 30 days of ownership Dell charges for ANY software support, which is separate from the HARDWARE warranty.  This isn't something new or something that they only want to charge you for support.

If you received a Windows XP OS disc you would have also received a Drivers and Utilities CD.  But, any drivers needed can be downloaded from the Dell downloads so if it was lost anything needed can be downloaded.

If you are in the US, you can request a set of Discs, which will include the Drivers and Utilities disc   HERE

Appreciate helpful reply, thank you fireberd. Good info.

Re password, no, there were never either BIOS or administrator passwords set by me or anyone else. I bought the laptop with just XP installed clean, with no user or administrator log on info required, and I never changed that. Fact.

I have seen posts on other forums re administrator passwords on safe mode & recovery console confirming exactly the issues I experienced on this.

If one phones Dell support from the US I'm not sure where your call centre might be, but from Ireland (where I live), the call goes through to some call centre in an Asian location I believe (without wishing to pinpoint the nationality). While in principle this might seem ok, my own experience of this hasn't been satisfactory and is also a factor in whether or not I might continue to buy Dell products.

Confirming the disk with Dell OEM XP was received (keep all these things in separate filing systems) but definitely no driver disk was received. Sorry, this is also fact.

I managed to get drivers from the Dell online driver resource, but it's not straightforward as the particular hardware onboard and the relevant drivers are not easily identified, and they are all mixed up with various Dell utilities. But, on a positive note, I got my laptop 'working' again to a satisfactory extent.

I have run some utilities on the Dell OEM XP SP2 disk and a significant number of warnings & shortfalls (errors) compared with retail XP were highlighted. It's not something I'm expert on, other than being 'streetwise' enough to recognise the potential for problems. I wouldn't be in a position to challenge your assertion re the Dell OEM XP installation being 'The Full Monty', but I think it would be moot whether it was the utility or the Dell OEM XP that was the issue with the errors & warnings I mentioned.

Good to discuss these issues and appreciate your valued input, thanks again & regards George

If I may - in addition to firebird's insightful comments - address some of the concerns you have mentioned:

The fact that it is asking for an admin password is not a Dell thing.  This is part of the Recovery Console (RC), as designed by Microsoft.  There are a host of settings and situations that will force RC to ask for the Admin password to get into RC.  If you didn't set a password, then it should be left blank.  Again, many things may cause it to not sign in properly at this point - bugs and situations known to Microsoft.  Might take a while to sift through the various KB's Microsoft has on the subject.  The unfortunate thing is that RC is often the only way to repair XP, short of reinstalling or the similar Repair Install, so it is a bit disheartening when it doesn't work - and a problem I have encountered with several OEM's, not just Dell.

Outsourced support?  An unfortunate trend in the industry, plagueing Dell, HP, Microsoft, and many other manufacturers' customers.  I don't think it's right, but if you pay for the higher level ProSupport, generally your call is taken by someone in the States - but it comes at the premium you pay for that level of support (which consequently includes software support).

I can also confirm that a Dell XP CD is exactly the same as a Retail XP CD except for the Dell references added to the BIOS-check portion of the installation.  As such, it contains no drivers unique to any particular system, requiring the drivers to be obtained from another source.  Systems normally ship with a driver CD, but as with any shipping/packing scenario, it can happen that it gets left out.  In any event, they are usually outdated within 3 months anyway, so the best place to go for drives is support.dell.com.  You can narrow down the drivers to the devices in your particular machine by entering your Service Tag instead of just the generic model.  I will grant you, however, that their Support Site leaves much to be desired in the way of finding the correct download formats, etc.  It takes some trial and error to know where to look for the right stuff.  Among many different brands, HP drivers page are the easiest to navigate, and I'd say Dell is next ... IBM/Lenovo and Acer are terrible.

As for SP3 ... I'm not sure I've ever encountered an issue with SP3, specifically, among the possibly hundreds of XP computers I've managed or worked with.  I do not know - nor could I find any significant changes/fixes to how SP3 handles RC, so I can't say whether or not those particular issues are addressed.

 Good luck.

Thank you Theflash1932 and fireberd for your very helpful comments. Great to have input from experienced people, appreciated.

Was nervous about SP3 but went ahead & it seems fine, thankfully! Think I will hope for the best now and leave the RC issue aside until needs must. Slightly worrying not knowing if the 'ejector seat' works! But, compared to the problems Japanese people currently have ........

Certainly I take your point re drivers outdating quickly. The lesson for me, now learned, is to print off & file system info on day1 so in the unfortunate event I know exactly what I'm looking for on the drivers/utilities support page if I need to. Agreed, the service tag is helpful in narrowing the selection.

Appreciate your insight on the outsourced support thing - guess we have to accept it as a function of the business model we are only prepared to pay for! Seems modern system reliability dulls our sense of value for top class support! Nothing like a jolt such as this as a wake up call.

Thanks again gentlemen & kind regards.

No problem ... take care :)

And if I may add in my 2 pence...

Now that SP3 and all the drivers are installed, get a copy of some hard drive imaging software (eg, Acronis, Ghost, freeware, etc) and create a backup CD/DVD with a 'clean' image of your hard drive.

That way, if you ever have to reinstall again, you can just re-image the hard drive from that CD/DVD and you'll be back in business in minutes. And if you're smart, you'll create new images every month or so, meaning all your data files will be backed up too. :emotion-5:

Ron

Ron, your input is much appreciated, thanks, you must have read my mind!

Absolutely, I take your point, makes complete sense. Shame I had to have a significant failure to come to my senses!! Fortunately the data was ok.

I don't have any experience with mirroring / boot disk / recovery software. I tried building a boot / RC disk from the original Dell OEM XP disk with BartPE but it threw up a pile of warnings & errors, and aborted the build before completion due to this. So no solution emerged from that!

What would you recommend? Norton Ghost seems the most popular. Have also noticed a few ads from Spotmau.com for BootSuite and they do a great job on talking themselves up.

Thanks again & look forward to your comments.

It comes down to features and price. But before you spend any cash, check the website for whatever brands of hard drive you have.

Seagate, for example, offers a free (limited) version of Acronis True Image to customers with a Seagate drive. My external USB drive is Seagate so I grabbed their version of Acronis. I image both the external Seagate and internal WD drive. The only issue is the limited version only makes full images each time, rather than incremental images of new/changed files. So it takes a while.

I store an image of the internal drive on the external and vice-versa, and I burn both on a CD too. The Acronis software allowed me to create a boot CD with software to restore the image to the internal drive in case the system ever fails to boot. (That would never happen to me ! :emotion-4:)

Good luck!

Ron

Much appreciated - very helpful Ron.

As it happens I just bought a Seagate external drive, so I'll have a look for that imaging software this weekend.

Was running the free AVG anitvirus software but have just upgraded to the latest Norton Antivirus (2011) which also gives me the ability to burn a bootup disk. So after a clean install, fresh setup & registry backed up, good time to do all that. Imaging would complete the arsenal.

If I can say, it's super that skilled & experienced people like yourself & the other gentlemen here who have helped me, make their advice freely available on forums like this.

Truly valuable service and in fact the likes of Dell should also be acknowleding this as no doubt it has a significant positive impact on their business model & bottom line, one way or another. Appreciated. And if I can ask, is your QTH (loc) Nth Am?

Thanks again!

Download Seagate DiscWizard from here.  Instructions to use DiscWizard to create an image here.

Do I detect a ham radio operator? Yes, Nth Am...

Ron

Much obliged many thanks Ron, sorry for late reply. Was ham op years back ZS6 callsign. Didnt continue in Irl

A lot of help on forums like this seems to come from people in NA more that anywhere else & its appreciated, thanks again & best regards George