11 replies to this topic

[GaryORLFC]

Hey there!

I had a Dell Inspiron 1525 laptop with Windows Vista pre-installed on it, I really got sick of Windows Vista and then upgraded to Windows XP and I have to say that it is great, works great and performs great.

The only problem is this: After I wiped WIndows Vista and installed Windows XP on my laptop, I needed to get drivers, so I went on to the Dell website and got the audio and video driver so everything will look and sound good. My question is, what other drivers do I need to make the PC perform to it's best?

As I said, I have a Dell Inspiron 1525 but it has no webcam or no bluetooth.

I don't exactly know what drivers to download of the Dell website so could someone tell me which drivers I must have. I already have the video and audio drivers installed.

Thank you.

[appleoddity]

Hi Gary.. Now a days, they have made it really difficult to move to Windows XP with a machine that has Vista on it. Laptops are especially hard because they are so proprietary in nature. I'm glad you seem to have gotten good functionality out of your laptop with Windows XP on it. The first thing to do is to look in control panel -> system -> hardware tab -> device manager. If any devices are showing a yellow exclamation point, you will need drivers for that device. It also sounds like Dell might be offering Windows XP drivers for this particular laptop? That is good. The usual drivers you may need to download are: Chipset Video Sound Modem Touchpad Wireless Wired LAN driver and a couple utilities to enable to "hotkey" buttons on the keyboard and laptop. The problem is, Dell often times puts different types of hardware in the same series of laptop and they will often times have two or three different drivers listed for the same type of device. Sometimes it is just a matter of trial and error until you get the right driver. It can be rather complicated at times. For instance, the wireless adapter usually has two or three drivers at least. One time, I had to download and install a certain wireless driver for a different model of adapter than what the laptop had because that package had the software for the "on/off" wireless button on the laptop. I then had to install the correct drivers for the model of adapter that was in the computer. That to me is ridiculously complicated for the average user. My best suggestion is that you check device manager for missing drivers. And, test the functionality of your various buttons on the laptop. That will get you started.

[GaryORLFC]

Thank you appleoddity for your reply.

I went into my Device Manager and under 'Other Devices' it displays a list of exclimation marks, the names of these devices are:

- Base System Device
- Base System Device
- Base System Device
- Modem Device on High Definition Audio Bus
- SM Bus Controller

Now, I right clicked on every one of these devices and clicked update but it did not find anything to update, so it didn't work basically.

Please take a look at this: http://support.euro....l...=WW1&osl=EN

Yes, Dell have made a page for the Dell Inspiron 1525 laptop fpr Windows XP drivers, which will make this easier on me. I was never any good with dealing with drivers as I just don't know which ones to install. Like, some drivers I would download, I would extract them, make the folder for them to be placed in and while it is installing the driver it says 'device cannot be found' and so it exits the installation.

Could you please point out which ones I must download?

Thanks!

[appleoddity]

http://support.euro....p;fileid=236863
http://support.euro....p;fileid=224383
http://support.euro....p;fileid=226633
http://support.euro....p;fileid=245333

That should finish off any remaining needed drivers and applications for full functionality.

Please double check device manager after you install the above to make sure all exclamation points are gone.

Edited by appleoddity, 04 July 2009 - 11:39 PM.

[GaryORLFC]

Thank you very much appleoddity. I appreciate it. They all installed properly, so I restarted my computer and then went into Device Manager only to see that under 'Other Devices' there was still: - Base System Device - Base System Device - Base System Device Looks like we got rid of 2 of them, any idea how to get rid of all them Base System Devices? Thanks.

[appleoddity]

Yes...

http://support.euro....p;fileid=224384

Its most likely your memory card reader but I didn't want to install the above link until I knew for sure. I couldn't remember what this "Base system device" usually was. I think the above link will fix that.

[GaryORLFC]

Yep, that done it, cheers! Only one more thing though, it only came up in the last hour or so. I have 2 laptops and now each one seems to connect to the internet, then not connect and then connect again. A better way of saying this would be on all laptops when you go into either Firefox or Internet Explorer, you would connect to a page no problem then click to another link and it would come up saying "Server Not Found" instantly. I keep clicking refresh and the same thing occurs and when I click refresh a few more times, the page will load up. Weird. We also have another laptop in the house, it's a mac and it connects to the Internet no problem and it uses Firefox. I have resetted my router to factory settings but it didn't work. Any solutions?

[appleoddity]

Hi Gary.. I'm glad you got the driver issue out of the way. Let me clarify something in your last post. You have 3 laptops (2 PCs and 1 Mac), and the 2 PCs are both dropping their wireless connectivity regularly, but the Mac does not? Is the Mac connected wirelessly also? Are you positive that the Mac is connected to the same wireless network and not accidentally to a neighbors wireless internet? The fact that two laptops are dropping connections points to your internet provider or wireless router. But, if the Mac is connected wireless to your network and not having a problem then I'm not sure where to start. It doesn't all add up, if you see. However, in a recent thread I wasted a whole lot of time with a guy trying to discover why wireless wasn't working right and all it was, was a drive issue. So, are the two laptops that aren't connecting properly similar models?

[GaryORLFC]

At the time I thought it was a bit strange too, but then I found out that the Mac had the same issue, it must have been the ISP.

Everything seems to work ok now on all laptops, the ISP must have got its act together.

I think I may have one last problem for you appleoddity.

In my favourites on Firefox I have a link that goes straight to an Irish radio station called FM 104. I saved the bookmark as http://www.fm104.ie/fm104.asx so when I click on it, it will open up in Firefox displaying Windows Media Player in the browser because I installed the plug-in. The only problem is that it does not play.

When I had Windows Vista installed on my laptop it worked fine.

Any solutions?

Thanks for your help.

Edited by GaryORLFC, 05 July 2009 - 07:29 PM.

[appleoddity]

HI Gary.. It doesn't play for me either. I'm using Internet Explorer. Sorry, but it appears their site is messed up or you have a bad link or something.

[Ztruker]

They definitely have a problem with their site. I tried it with FF, IE, SeaMonkey and Opera. Also tried it directly from Windows Media Player. All hang with the Buffering message and get not further.

[GaryORLFC]

Yep you are both right. I tried it just there and now it seems to be working fine! Their server must have been down for a few days.