Successfull downgraded Dell XPS M1330 to Windows XP

For me Vista is sucks, users always complain how slow their computer, network always not connected to the internet and bla bla bla.

So we decided to downgrade to Windows XP and hope dell.com will support us for all the drivers. Before we go on to the next step, just wanna remaind you that Dell has two type of XPX M1330 series, the one with dedicated display card form NVidia and another one with shared graphic card from Intel.  This tutorial is for  Dell XPS M1330 with nvidia chipset inside.

I found great tutorial on the net : http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=153941

 Its OFFICIAL! Windows XP works on the XPS m1330! GUIDE included!

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Most Recent Update: Jan.31, 2008…UPDATED! I have included direct links to all the drivers, including a better order to install them in…For your info, my machine was ordered on July 4 and received Aug 7 in to Montreal, Canada. It has the following specs:

XPS M1330, MATTE BLACK
C2D T7300 (2.0GHZ)
2GB, DDR2, 667 MHZ
LED display with camera
GEFORCE 8400M 128MB
200GB 7200rpm HARD DRIVE
8X DVD+/-RW SLOT DRV
Bluetooth
Dell

1505 Wireless N
(No fingerprint reader)

OK, so now for the Windows XP walkthrough…

Step 1… You need a version of Windows XP SP2 with built-in SATA drivers… I personally used LastXP (feel free to go find this on a torrent site somewhere, you have the option to install one of your own valid XP keys as part of its setup). (The other way is to put SATA drivers on a USB stick and hit F6 during initial Windows setup…). If this all seems like too much work for you, then you can avoid the whole SATA issue by going into your BIOS, and changing the hard drive mode from SATA to IDE mode.

Step 2… Start the computer with the Windows XP disk in the drive, and hit F12 to load the boot menu…. Pick CD/DVD drive…

Step 3… Windows setup will now boot (blue screens, etc). Here you will have the option to format your harddrive…

Dell likes to partition their drive into 4 partitions… 2 of them hidden partitions… (Boot partition, Recovery partition, OS partition, Mediadirect partition) I deleted them all and started from scratch (I burned the recovery partition to a DVD beforehand anyways, just in case). One of the partitions is for MediaDirect, but this is such a useless program, I would much rather have those 4 GB it eats up…

I’d recommend partitioning the harddrive into 2 partitions, one for the OS, and one for everything else… I chose 40 GB for C: and 160 GB for D: (NTFS of course)

Ok, now windows installs…

Step 4… DRIVERS! DRIVERS! DRIVERS!

FIRST, I’d recommend installing the Intel Mobile Chipset drivers from the Dell website:
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=205326

 

SECOND, I’d recommend installing the latest nVidia drivers v169.09 from here:
http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/…howtopic=16154

Don’t forget to download and copy over the modded file nv4_disp.inf BEFORE running the driver installation!

THIRD, you should go download and install the following from the Dell Support website for the m1330 and Windows XP:

Ricoh Memory Card Drivers:
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=188377

 

Broadcom 59XX 10100 Ethernet Controller Driver:
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=207055

Broadcom 59XX 10100 Ethernet Controller Utility:
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=201425

Creative Labs Laptop Integrated Webcam: (only if you have it of course)
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=235336

Dell Touchpad – Pointing Stick:
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=207655

SIGMATEL STAC 92XX C-Major HD Audio:
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=235761

Dell Wireless 1505 Draft 802.11n WLAN Mini-Card:
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=236819

UPEK Fingerprint Reader: (only if you have it of course)
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=209514

FOURTH, it gets a little tricky now, because Dell hasn’t updated their m1330 drivers site very well…

Here are links to working drivers for the following parts:

Dell Wireless 355 Bluetooth Module (Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR): (only if you have it of course)
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=216131

 

Dell Quickset Drivers v3.4:
http://support.dell.com/support/down…&fileid=222116

FIFTH, download and install the latest Directx runtimes:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d…displaylang=en

VOILA! That’s it…you now have a perfectly running XPS m1330 in Windows XP! Of course, this is for my configuration. If you have a different wireless card for example, obviously I’d recommend installing the appropriate driver instead…

This machine flies in Windows XP by they way… I will have to start doing some benchmarking, but a quick test of the harddrive shows my burst speed at over 90 MB/s and an average throughput of over 53 MB /sec!

And in case you were wondering, there are no flagged items in Device Manager…

Take care, and enjoy your new FASTER toy

snowbro

 

For those who have Dell XPS M1330 with shared graphic, dont worry cause Dell dosn’t provide one

Just kidding, Dell doesn’t provide you one on the M1330 section but you can use Latitude D630 for this purpose cause they were using the same chipset. And also for modem driver, you wont be able to use vista driver but you can use it from Dell Latitude D430 section.

That’s all, enjoy your Windows XP on Dell XPS M1330, i found it very fast compared with the one with Vista inside.

Cheers,

EdwinHC

Sorry I haven’t updated this link in awhile (almost 6 months now!)… I’ve switched to Vista

(tweaked its actually not bad)…Feel free to look for newer versions of all the software linked to below….

I figured I’d write a little step-by-step on how to get Windows XP

SP2 installed on our new little baby

I have nothing against Vista, and it actually is a pretty nice OS when properly tweaked, however, I still think it’ll be much better once SP-1 is released…

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