I go back to 1962 and room size computers with tubes :emotion-11: My first "home" computer was a Commodore Vic 20.
All new computers for the last at least 5 years have only used USB keyboard and mouse. The PS/2 type interface is gone (along with RS 232 Serial and Centronics Parallel Printer ports).
The XPS400 was an upgrade to the 8400. The XPS line, at the time, was Dell's top of the line consumer models. The XPS400 is about the same as my Dimension E510, which superceeded the 8400 models. Our models are BTX configuration, not ATX (just FYI).
On some models only certain ports are active at boot up (and on others it doesn't matter). I would connect the keyboard and mouse to the two USB ports just below the audio ports on the motherboard I/O panel.
Many Dell's have a Recovery Partition on the hard drive, accessed by CTRL/F11 at initial boot and if yours has this use the Recovery Partition to restore the PC. It does not require any CD's.
On the XPS 400 you can Press F12 and that will allow you to boot from a CD.
Windows XP has a "Repair" mode that, depending on the problems, will "repair" XP and you won't have to do a complete reinstall.
The Dell Windows XP CD that you got with the 8400 may or may not work with XPS400. Did Dell send you a new set of CD's for the XPS400? At a minimum you need the Windows XP CD. There should also be a driver and utilities CD but if not you can download any drivers needed.
When you finally get it to boot from the CD and do an install, the required install sequence is (1) Install Windows (2) Install chipset drivers (3) Install device drivers such as sound, video, etc.
Thanks for the great info. My problem was the "repair" option of the Windows menu. The USB mouse/keyboard worked up unitl you chose "Repair Installation" and then everything went away. I finally did a full, clean install and everything worked fine. Unfortunately, I am still downloading patches, etc. Hope to be back where I was in about a week or so.
fireberd
9 Legend
•
33.4K Posts
0
July 29th, 2009 12:00
I go back to 1962 and room size computers with tubes :emotion-11: My first "home" computer was a Commodore Vic 20.
All new computers for the last at least 5 years have only used USB keyboard and mouse. The PS/2 type interface is gone (along with RS 232 Serial and Centronics Parallel Printer ports).
The XPS400 was an upgrade to the 8400. The XPS line, at the time, was Dell's top of the line consumer models. The XPS400 is about the same as my Dimension E510, which superceeded the 8400 models. Our models are BTX configuration, not ATX (just FYI).
On some models only certain ports are active at boot up (and on others it doesn't matter). I would connect the keyboard and mouse to the two USB ports just below the audio ports on the motherboard I/O panel.
Many Dell's have a Recovery Partition on the hard drive, accessed by CTRL/F11 at initial boot and if yours has this use the Recovery Partition to restore the PC. It does not require any CD's.
On the XPS 400 you can Press F12 and that will allow you to boot from a CD.
Windows XP has a "Repair" mode that, depending on the problems, will "repair" XP and you won't have to do a complete reinstall.
The Dell Windows XP CD that you got with the 8400 may or may not work with XPS400. Did Dell send you a new set of CD's for the XPS400? At a minimum you need the Windows XP CD. There should also be a driver and utilities CD but if not you can download any drivers needed.
When you finally get it to boot from the CD and do an install, the required install sequence is (1) Install Windows (2) Install chipset drivers (3) Install device drivers such as sound, video, etc.
slhudson
2 Posts
0
August 4th, 2009 21:00
Thanks for the great info. My problem was the "repair" option of the Windows menu. The USB mouse/keyboard worked up unitl you chose "Repair Installation" and then everything went away. I finally did a full, clean install and everything worked fine. Unfortunately, I am still downloading patches, etc. Hope to be back where I was in about a week or so.
Again, thanks for the info.