What If?

[bigpoppa1978]

I have a desktop that has Vista installed on it. I want to switch to
XP, but my computer dosen't have any windows drivers. How or can I
even install XP? It's an E_Machine. I checked online and the company
doesn't even have Drivers for XP....Any ideas???Thanks.....

 

[Alias]

I have a desktop that has Vista installed on it. I want to switch to
XP, but my computer dosen't have any windows drivers. How or can I
even install XP? It's an E_Machine. I checked online and the company
doesn't even have Drivers for XP....Any ideas???Thanks.....

You are stuck with Vista unless you want to install Ubuntu,
www.ubuntu.com which will have the drivers for your machine. Either that
or take the machine back and insist on one with XP. Do it when the store
is full of people and say it in a loud, but polite voice.

Alias

 

[JS]

You can try Belarc Advisor: http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html
It does a good job of providing a wealth of information about your PC,
including most if not all the information you need for identifying the
components and the drivers you will need.

You will need to identify each component that makes up your system.
Like the motherboard manufacturer (assuming it's not a custom board built
and supported only by E Machines), your Video card or onboard video chip,
Sound card/chip, Network card/chip and so forth. For each of these you will
need to go to the motherboard, video, sound, network, etc manufacture's web
site and see if a Windows XP driver is available.

Also I would make an Image backup of your PC (along with a bootable recovery
CD for use with the image backup software)with Vista installed just in case
Windows XP simply will not run despite all the effort you have put in.

As an alternative to that image backup, if you have a spare hard drive, then
remove the drive that has Vista installed on it and use the spare drive to
install XP. If it doesn't work just put the Vista drive back into the PC.

JS

 

[RJK]

Why not use Vista ? Which version Vista ?
i.e. We'll all end up with Vista eventually, ....pretty much like all those,
(including me), that tried to"stay with" W98 ended up having to move to XP
for various reasons, including hardware evolution !!!
(...I haven't got Vista on any of my machines yet btw), ...and I have to say
that, on the Vista machines I've worked on, it all looks very much like XP
but, made much harder to do simple things in, ...like trying to drop a new
hosts file into Vista, ...one had to fight with "Permissions" etc.
....ridiculous !!!

Identify motherboard make and model, graphics and sound chips make and model
i.e. onboard or PCI / PCI-e card etc. ...and visit manufacturers websites
to collect XP drivers, ...if available.
....not forgetting that the XP drivers library supports a large amount of
hardware, ...if somewhat slightly older !!

In other words, in my humble opinion, the time spent fighting to replace
Vista with XP, would be better spent grinding through the learning curve
with Vista !!

....unless of course application software compatibility is your issue !

regards, Richard

 

[AJR]

To install XP requires having the XP installation CD>

Note: "...but my computer dosen't have any windows drivers...." this is not
an issue. Boot from XP CD - select disk format - install XP - keep in mind
taht programs will have to be reinstalled - Vista data lost unless backed
up.

 

[p]

Why not use Vista ? Which version Vista ?
i.e. We'll all end up with Vista eventually, ....

Many will continue to use XP and/or Linux. Others will skip Vista and
wait for Windows 7, especially businesses.

P

 

[HeyBub]

To install XP requires having the XP installation CD>

Note: "...but my computer dosen't have any windows drivers...." this
is not an issue. Boot from XP CD - select disk format - install XP -
keep in mind taht programs will have to be reinstalled - Vista data
lost unless backed up.

It certainly IS an issue.

If the OS has no method of talking to the hardware (this method is called a
"driver"), the combination simply will not work.

Some incompatibilities can be overcome. If, for example, there are no XP
drivers for the built in video, sound, network, or other functions, these
functions might be able to be overcome with replacement hardware (a new
video card, for example).

 

[Kelly]

Hi,

Other than XP finding most of your drivers, Belarc will provide you with
enough information to obtain the rest - especially video and audio. The
transition is fairly painless. )

--

All the Best,
Kelly (MS-MVP/DTS&XP)

Taskbar Repair Tool Plus!
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/taskbarplus!.htm

SupportSpace
www.supportspace.com/pages?aiu=kellyskorner

 

[GHalleck]

Hi,

Other than XP finding most of your drivers, Belarc will provide you with
enough information to obtain the rest - especially video and audio. The
transition is fairly painless. )

Just how "generic" is an E-Machines computer today? Most of the time,
this tact would work with computers being asembled with off-the-shelf
components.

 

[AJR]

Note frrom the original post "...I want to switch to
XP, but my computer dosen't have any windows drivers. How or can I even
install XP?..."

bigpoppa1978 is not referring to drivers for installed hardware etc.. (My
opinion) - again note "...How or can I even install XP?..." he is using
"windows drivers"
in refernce to XP installation (Again - my take).

 

[db.·.. >]

if the e machine came
preinstalled with windows
xp, then you likely have a
factory restoration feature.

btw: belarc has nothing
to provide that is relevant
for installing operating
systems.

 

[Big_Al]

Many will continue to use XP and/or Linux. Others will skip Vista and
wait for Windows 7, especially businesses.

P

From the sounds of it, some may skip windows 7 too.