Its OFFICIAL! Windows XP works perfectly on the XPS m1330!

I got my dell xps 1330 in september, where I imediatly after installed windows xp.
However last wednesday I got my motherboard changed because of static discharge from the laptop.
The new motherboard they have installed, is however NOT windows xp compatible in any way.
I've been on the phone for 2 hours now talking with a dell support guy, and he tried to reinstall the chipset drivers, checked the computer in safe mode and all kinds of things.
In the end he told me I will have to upgrade my computer to vista since theres nothing more he can do.
I asked if it was possible to just get my old motherboard back, or just a similar one since they are now using new motherboards for the xps m1330, which he said was impossible.
So the only real option I have is to install vista, which I will hate my laptop and me for the rest of my days for.
Before I install vista I would like to hear if anyone here has any idea which I havent tried - maybe an idea as to how I get my hands on one of the old version motherboards which they seem to just dump in a big black hole from which there is no escape.
Or if people have similar experiences and how they dealt with it.

 

not me, i went with N. I have fios and N can take advantage of that extra speed.

 

How is this possible?
I'm sure someone else will chime in, but I think it should be possible to install XP.

 

Interesting to hear of problems with the new motherboards....

My XPS M1330 has to go back and i will be sent a new one... probably with the new motherboard..

I think its time for me to give up trying to put XP on a machine designed for Vista... damn shame but what can i do!

There is a thread on the Dell community on Xp Pro/ XPS 1330 if anyone wants to try to continue, but which is unhelpfully NOT in the XPS forum... but here:

http://www.dellcommunity.com/suppor...read.id=253132&view=by_date_ascending&page=21

zonker

 

I'm not entirrely sure where the problem is, but I believe the problem is that the chipset driver does not work properly on the new motherboard.

What I mean by saying that xp does not work on the new motherboard is that it will make your computer immensly slow, took 5 min just to reboot (normally it took around 30 sec), when I tried to use winamp it used all the processing power and was unable to play more than just a few scratchy noises every now and then - it was too slow to even play a song!
And opening mozilla or internet explorer was something you could go to the toilet before it was done doing.

 

Might be a bad MoBo actually.

I just received my 1330 and it is running XP quite fine. I just reloaded using the Dell XP downloads.

 

That's what I would have thought.
I think there is another problem going on. XP install shouldn't be a problem.

 

I've just received a XPS M1330 and almost everything in the original post worked (So thanks very much!)

However I noticed mine came with a different graphics, audio and chipset to the ones in the original post.

What you probably need is the INTEL INTEGRATED GMA X3100 driver. Visit Intel.com and either click drivers and downloads and search for GMA x3100 or use this link to download the drivers:
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=N&ProductID=2800&DwnldID=15282&strOSs=44&OSFullName=Windows*%20XP%20Professional&lang=eng

Another good tip is to use the Dell website to find out what your system configuration is, visit Dell.com click Support Home Page > Technical Support > System Configuration and enter your service tag on the original system configuration tab - this should display what your laptop came with.

Thanks
Dan

 

Forgot to mention - when I close the lid on my laptop the screen now goes off and the system goes into standby!

Very happy with this laptop now Windows XP is working on it!

 

OK, updated the 1st page finally...

 

Thanks for the update!

-Funk

 

i installed the same bluetooth 355 WIDCOMM 5.1 driver that you posted, and also the sigmatel driver you posted.

when i use my laptop, the bluetooth stereo headset and audio headset devices in device manager disable the sigmatel audio drivers.

did you get this problem too? if so, how did you fix it?

thanks

 

i just got mine yesterday. installed xp pro and got all my drivers from this thread. thanks for the information folks.

 

Thanks to everyone who has posted in this thread.

Before I found this, I was able to get everything working with XP Pro (wish I had found this thread first!)...

Well... almost everything. I can't get the card reader to work. I have installed the driver for the Ricoh chipset from the Dell site for XP Pro, but it just doesn't work. Whenever I insert my SD card, absolutely nothing happens. I've removed the three Ricoh devices from the IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers in device manager, and reinstalled the Dell driver. It simply doesn't work.

Is anyone else having this issue? Anyone confirmed that theirs is working with XP?

This is really annoying, and if I can't get this working, I'm going back to Vista *cringe*

 

Well Dell is apparently tuning their systems to get better battery life out of the advanced power functions that Vista offers (previous unused)... Less reason to switch to XP?

 

I have successfully installed XP on this laptop but I can't get the remote to work. Is there a software that needs to be installed in order for it to work? Thanks

 

grrrr... I forgot all about testing the remote. If I can't get that and the card reader to work, I'm most likely going back to Vista Ultimate.

 

NM, the remote works. You have to point it to the headphones plug.

 

Alright everyone, issue has been FIXED!!

Get the latest Sigmatel HD 32-bit WinXP compatible audio drivers at:
http://drivers.softpedia.com/get/SO.../Sigmatel-STAC-HD-Audio-Driver-61053370.shtml

Get the latest Broadcom BT WIDCOMM drivers at (After installing your original Dell drivers!!):
http://drivers.anycom.com/bluetooth/usb-200-250/anycom-bluetooth-usb200-250-windows-v5-1-0-4200.exe

Sync'd up my PLT510 hands-free and Sigmatel drivers were still OK!

Let me know if this fix works for you!

 

I finally got my computer running at normal speed again in windows xp.
However I do have a feeling my video driver is ****ed, I got the GMA X3100 integrated gfx - and I'm fairly sure that before my laptop ****ed up I was running windows in 1400*1200? (atleast the first one was 1400) , however now I am only able to select 1200*800 as max resolution, plz tell me that is'nt normal.

 

Will this work on M1530 but with these drivers?

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=193815&page=22

I've been looking for some sort of M1530 guide but I haven't found any.

If not, maybe I'll end up loving Vista when it comes

 

I can *CONFIRM* that the Ricoh drivers work w/XP. I've used it numerous times with my Sandisk Ultra II 2gb SD.

 

Well, I was thinking about switching back to Vista, but my XP OS partition right now is plenty big enough and happy with its 25gb's. If I switched to Vista, I'd have to more than double it to 62gb. Vista requires:

40gb Vista HP ( http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/buyorupgrade/capable.mspx)
+4gb for hibernation (if you have 4gb ram)
+18gb for apps + temp/cache files
----------------------------------
62 gb

Depending on the amount of apps you plan to install. Compared to my XP:

3gb XP
+4gb for hibernation (if you have 4gb ram)
+18gb for apps + temp/cache files
--------------------------------
25gb

I don't see the point in wasting 37gb because of a bloated OS. My old m1210 had a 200gb hd and when I bought this m1330, I upgraded the hd to 250gb, but all that extra space would be negated if I had to switch back to Vista. I've currently got MSO2003 & CS3 & DPP 3.2 & a bunch of other smaller appz installed (and fully updated) and I still have 10gb free!

Plus, XP runs so much faster!

Hope that helps.

For the record: I can't get my SLEEP button to work right. It keeps wanting to hibernate and I still can't get hibernation to work, some DLL error. So, when I sleep it, I have to do it thru the START BAR. I know there's a shortcut app for sleeping it using command line, so I'll probably look for it someday and create a shortcut on my ROCKETDOCK to make life easier. Hence, I've freed up another 4gb by turning hibernation off.

NOTE: When I installed Quickset, try NOT to install its power managment features because it may conflict w/XP's. I'll try uninstalling and doing that and see if it helps...someday.

 

You should point those guys over here as well. Cross-collaboration. Thanks for the link!

 

Dell has updated their:

*BIOS to A09
*Fingerprint reader drivers, it actually WORKS now!!
*Webcam drivers, never really had problems with it before, don't see any improvements with the new ones

Also, I had majorly annoying problems when using OP's suggested Nvidia drivers. Randomly, when going out of sleep mode or after rebooting, XP would not be able to "enable the card."

It was impossible to re-enable it, even after uninstalling and reinstalling the drivers. So, I'd have to redo the entire OS...ya, you heard that right!

On the last OS redo, I stuck w/Dell's Nvidia drivers and it's been running smoothly ever since. Sucks tho, because OP's drivers had some extra features, like the ability to crop the outgoing HDMI signal so that it fits my plasma with pixel perfection precision.

I'm going to be patient and hope there will be a fix that will allow us to use OP's Nvidia drivers someday.

So far, I've got everything working with XP on this machine except:

*sleep button wants to go into hibernation
*can't use hacked Nvidia drivers (this is a YMMV anyway, so I'm not concerned)
*can't use Activesync on BT w/my HTC Touch, all other BT services work tho, but AFAIK, this is more a problem w/the BT 355 Dell BT stack. I read that if you use the XP SP2 BT stack, it should work. I'll play around w/it when I get more time.
*can't use the "customize home key" hack (as w/all hacks, YMMV anyway so no biggie)

I'm pretty happy with this machine now running XP!! It's speedier, uses less RAM and less HD space!

 

how can I know if my XP supports SATA???

 

I have the strangest problem with my laptop.
Whenever I put in the Power cable my laptop is running really really slow (like 10% of normal performance), and whenever im not running with the AC power connected to my laptop its running at normal performance.

The effect is instant, I can sit and surf on the internet, plug in my power cable and it will turn slow the very second I do this, and the very second I pull the power cable out of my laptop again it instantaniously reaches normal performances again... WTF??

Has anyone ever experienced this before or anything quite like it? - what would you suggest I do?

 

If you have SATA enabled in your BIOS and you're not getting a BSOD when you boot into XP, then that means your XP SATA drivers are working!

 

Hey, I got my M1330 two days ago, and I was now ready to install XP on it. But there are some problems. I changed to IDE mode in BIOS, and I have a XP CD with SP2. But the problem comes when I try to install windows, it wont copy over the .xml files or the ServicePack files... does anyone know why this happens? Becaue my brother installed XP onto his Zepto 6224 without troubles with this CD...

 

Uhm, any error messages?

-Funk

 

Are you using a real Windows XP disc or a hacked version? My guess is that it's a botched slipstream. Try using a real XP disc and then update the SP's after installation.

 

Hey guys,

I am brand new here and quite frankly, pretty much suck with computers. I just bought an M1330 that will arrive in a week or so and need to convert it over to XP. I have a friend who is going to help me through the process but I am trying to collect everything ahead of time.

Will a Windows XP SP2 (2002) Dell rebuild disk work to load XP? I already own this and would like to avoid buying another version if I can help it and would prefer not to use a hacked version.

Thanks,

DeepSix

 

Yes! Yes! Yes!

 

Awesome, Thank you!

I want to thank everyone who contributes here. It has been a huge help to me. You guys have made it possible to put decent operating system on one of the coolest laptops out there.

DeepSix

 

Good good.... I was thinking of order one and put xp on it.
I also heard a lot of horror stories on m1330 problem which make me think twice about getting one....

 

BoredBill-

I had the same problems as you... Ricoh card reader would not work under Windows XP. My symptoms where:

• Drivers installed properly
• All devices show up under Device Manager - no exclamations
• Inserting an SD card would pop up the Safely Remove Hardware icon in system tray
• SD card reader is NOT listed anywhere under Computer Management --> Disk Management

My specific problem was that the next available drive letter after the "physical" drives (hard drive C:, and optical drive D was E:. However, I had my E: drive mapped to a network drive. For some reason, the Ricoh drivers kept trying to mount the SD card as drive E, despite that drive letter being used.

I tried to play around with a bunch of settings, but the only thing that worked was to mount my network drive as some other drive letter, and keep E: free for the Ricoh SD/MMC card reader. After that, everything worked fine.

 

Horror stories? "Don't believe the hype"
They very good notebooks end of...
Now if you want Horror stories there used to be a forum call Vaio city back in the dayz yeah dealing with Sony issues now there you'll read about horror stories.

 

I have had some problems with even getting my XPS to work properly in Vista. Dell shipped it without the Notebook System driver NSS...which they say is important for USB systems functioning properly. They have sent me the official Dell order for installing drivers - albeit in Vista, and say that it really matters which order they are installed...this is it:
Dell™ Notebook System Software
Intel® Mobile Chipset Driver
Mobile Intel® GMA OR NVIDIA® GeForce® 8400M GS Video Controller [as appropriate]
Ricoh® R5C833 Media Card Controller
Fingerprint Reader Driver
Intel Flash Cache Logic Chip (Intel Turbo Memory)
Broadcom® 59XX 10/100 Integrated Network Controller
Wireless driver (if applicable)
IDT® STAC 9205 Audio Driver
Modem driver
Dell Touch Pad Driver
Bluetooth® driver and stack

The order of the rest apparently doesn't matter. Anyone want to give that a try and see if it works? I have been trying to get an XP Pro SATA enabled disk out of Dell for ages but without success as yet. I want to use their OEM version of XP but my old D610 isnt SATA so i can't use that (dont want to mess with the BIOS...)

 

To get your computer working with SATA drivers (AHCI mode), you will need to either use a floppy drive when you install WinXP, slipstream drivers (using something like nLite), or follow the instructions here:

I got AHCI enabled under WinXP!!

• Installed WinXP in ATA mode (not AHCI)
• Did not want to slipstream a WinXP CD
• Did not want to bother with F6 / floppy drive - I don't own an external floppy drive
• Attempting to switch HDD from ATA mode to AHCI mode after WinXP install would result in BSOD

Here's how:
1) Download the Intel Matrix Storage Manager here:
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Product_Filter.aspx?ProductID=2101&lang=eng

2) Once you download the file, run it with a -a switch:
iata76_enu.exe -a
This will NOT install the Matrix Storage Manager. What this will do is run the installer, and ONLY EXTRACT the files to C:\Program Files\Intel\Intel Matrix Storage Manager. Again, this does NOT install anything.

3) Your drivers are now located in C:\Program Files\Intel\Intel Matrix Storage Manager. They will be found in either \Driver, or \Driver64, depending on whether you're running a 32-bit or 64-bit OS.

4) Go to Device Manager --> IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers. Double-click on the Intel ICH8M 3-port SATA Controller - 2828... remember, *ONLY* click on the device that ends with 2828.

5) Go to Driver tab, and choose to Update Driver.

6) Tell the Wizard prompts:
- No, not this time
- Install from a list or specific location (Advanced)
- Don't Search. I will choose the driver to install.
- Click the "Have Disk" button. Point it to C:\Program Files\Intel\Intel Matrix Storage Manager\Driver (or Driver64).
- The driver you want to install for WinXP 32-bit for the Dell XPS M1330 is Intel 82801HEM/HBM SATA AHCI Controller
- After you install the driver and click OK out of every menu, reboot the laptop.

7) During reboot, go into BIOS and turn on AHCI mode and Flash Module

8) Voila! WinXP will boot up with no BSOD!

 

I have two issues that does not work perfectly using xp on this machine; first I cannot find any touchpad driver that remembers my preferences after a reboot, and I can only get the bluetooth light/symbol to shut down using this procedure; activate radio-deactivate radio, then the blutooth indicator shuts down. Have anyone been able to get these features to work properly? Not big problems but I find them annoying.

 

Just tonight i placed my order for an m1330, when i was on the phone with the salesman and he asked me about which version of vista i wanted, i asked him if i can downgrade to xp...he said no, because there are no xp drivers available for the system...i'm trying to put together all the drivers i need ahead of time, so by the time i get the computer I will have the drivers all ready. I was on the dell support site, and under drivers and downloads, i put in the dell xps m1330 and put operating system as windows XP, they then gave me all the drivers I need...has anybody seen this/ know if it all works? please let me know...thanks...

 

Are you seriously posting in this thread, and asking if Windows XP will work on the M1330?

 

no cuz obviously it does...the title of thread kinda maybe gives that away....im asking if the drivers on dells website under m1330 windows xp are all the drivers i need and they work correctly.....i was asking for an answer not a smart remark...thanks though

 

Yes, All the drivers from Dells webpage will work just fine.

You may bump into some problems though, but all the solutions are in this thread. You would save yourself a lot of time if you just read through all the posts. All you need to know is here.

 

That sounds wonderful! Where in this thread is the solution for the issues about touchpad settings and bluetooth? You did mention "all solutions" .

 

I have done the following xp procedure, have everything working 100% , thanks...

EXCPET the blue LED bluetooth/wifi switch on the side does not light up altough it does work fine!!enables and disables, just the light wont come on/off, enabled in bios etc. would this be a driver problem?? the led worked before with vista and the laptop is only 7 days old!

any suggestions?

 

Do you get your touchpad to keep your custom settings after a reboot?

 

I finally got everything working - thanks for all the info. Only problem now is the USB Root Hub are all yellow in Device Manager and none of my USB devices work. I installed the Intel Chipset R153997.exe but no luck. Please help...

 

It will only light up when system is in off state (no power on) forward and hold for about 2seconds. It only indicates wifi hotspots ok with your system now off turn on the wifi switch on the side then slide wifi manager/catcher switch if there are any wifi hotspots the blue led will come on and blink ruffly every 2 seconds..

 

I read more into the forum and the 20+ pages. I did as someone recommended, removed the USB Root Hub items in Device Manager, rebooted, and it found new hardware and auto installed everything.

Thanks guys/gals. Working 100% fine now.