Dumping Win 7 and reverting back to XP

The 8100 is not XP compatible - there are only Windows 7 64 bit  Dell device drivers, no support for XP, thus if you installed Win XP some of the devices would not work.   If you MUST have Windows XP, take it back and buy a used PC with XP or build one yourself that will run XP.  PC Vendors can no longer sell PC's with Windows XP (Microsoft stopped that back in October).     

Windows 7 Professional will run a Windows XP "Virtual Machine" inside Windows 7 but it too can have problems with some of the hardware devices. 

Or, have you tried installing and running the older programs in an XP compatibility mode? 

Given the hardware in this system, you may have a heck of a time getting XP to run properly.  Intel does not have XP drivers for some of the devices, and it is Intel's drivers on which Dell builds their versions.

As Firebird said, there are a couple of ways to get this to work in Windows 7:

1)  Compatibility Mode.  If you get it installed, but it doesn't run properly, right-click the program icon, Properties, check the Compatibility Mode box and select XP XP3.  This doesn't work for everything, but does for some things.

2)  XP Mode.  Since you upgraded to Pro, you now have a license to run XP in a virtual machine.  Go to the link below to get and install XP Mode.  First, go to the BIOS Setup (F2) and Enable VT (Virtualization Technology.  This will run a version of XP that runs within Windows 7 and will run nearly all XP programs.  There are a few restrictions - focused mainly around hardware.  It will not do graphics well, like some games, CAD apps, video editing, etc., as XP Mode doesn't have direct access to the video hardware.

What kind of apps are you having problems with that won't run on Windows 7?  Some software mfg's have patches or updates to make it more stable with Windows 7, but granted, some software simply won't work in Windows 7.

"I have heard that the memory in Win7 is not compatible with Win XP" ... not sure what you mean by this.

Please edit your post and remove your email address! It's a violation of the forum's terms of use to include any personal info such as an email address.

The moderators may delete this entire thread if you don't remove the email address. And be prepared for the ton of spam you're likely to get after you post your address in a public forum. :emotion-5:

Ron

I just don't like Windows 7 period!

Found it. Sorry about that.

How do I edit my post?

The best advice I can give is "get used to it".  Win 7 is here to stay. 

PG ... don't get left behind!  Windows 7 is for real, and as firebird said, it is not going away.  If you don't learn to like Windows 7, Windows 8 won't be any better, 9 even worse, and pretty soon you're going to be out of the loop altogether, and your grandkids will talk about how ancient grandpa's XP computer is that he always talks about :) 

Look, if you are up for an adventure, then try and install XP - you might get it to work, but this is not for beginners or the faint of heart.  We will help you if we can - let us know when you're ready to try ... just know, that it may not work.  Give the options we've discussed a shot - let us know (SPECIFICS) how it goes and what problems you run into.  To start, you need a valid version of XP to install (Retail or VL/OL licensed version of XP - cannot be an XP disk from another Dell or another PC brand).

Best option is to use a different hard drive to TRY to install XP.  Leave the original drive as is, when you find out XP isn't working or not everything is working in XP you don't have to try and reinstall.   Keep in mind you don't have discs to reinstall and if you install something other than the OS that comes with the PC the Dell recovery partition will no longer work and you won't be able to reinstall Win 7, if you wanted.  Installing on a different hard drive eliminates all the headaches.