Any Dell Dimension XP users please for the love of god help!

[Chekhonte]

I was just given a Dell Dimension 4600 computer and I fucked up. I wanted to reinstall XP but didn't have the OS disk from dell. I had the bright idea to use my OS disk from my compaq computer. It seemed to work until I realized that the compaq disk doesn't have the drivers for the video card, sound card and most importantly the ethernet or modem! I can't even go online to download the drivers because I can't use the ethernet port. Plus I have to activate it in 30 days.

If any of you have a dell dimension computer would you please for the love of god mail me a copy of your OEM XP Home disk? It's no illegal since I have a legitimate key on the side of my computer. I can even take and post a pic of my computer with my user name writen on a piece of paper. I know I really don't have much clout here but I"m begging you.

P.S. I tried downloading a torrent of the dell OEM disk but it was a bad download or perhaps even a bad cd burn and it hangs on the "press any key to boot from disk" screen upon boot up.

[hungrych]

Couldn't you just use a regular XP disk?

[hungrych]

Actually, you could probably find the ethernet drivers online and burn it to a cd to use, and the key from the compaq XP cd would probably work.

[Chekhonte]

Couldn't you just use a regular XP disk?

No, saddly the OEM key's won't work with the retail disks. Also if I try to register using a different OEM disk I'll get a message saying "please call microsoft to verify your copy of windows". I'll have to call microsoft. I could lie and say I had to replace my motherboard and that is why OEM version of windows won't recognize my Dell BIOS, but I"m a nervous person and a terrible liar. I'd rather get a new disk.

Actually, you could probably find the ethernet drivers online and burn it to a cd to use, and the key from the compaq XP cd would probably work.

Yeah that's a good idea. In fact I'm typing this on my new computer right now. I can't believe I didn't think of that. It's just one of the compounding list of reasons that sugests to me that I am in fact retarded. I went to the dell website after reading this and downloaded my video, sound and network drivers. Thanks.

I still have the problem of not being able to register my copy of windows with out calling microsoft. If anybody has a dell OS disk I'd still love it!

[JBLoudG20]

I'll check for you, I might have an old Dell XP SP1 disk from when I had my laptop.

You might have to remind me though

[Chekhonte]

Ok thanks. I'll remind you in a week or two if I haven't heard from you.

[Bill Ward]

You're probably going to need more than the OEM XP disk.

Dell shipped separate disks for the operating system, chipset and device drivers, fax/modem, soundcard, and system software.

Check - http://support.dell.com/ Under Dimension and then 4600.

They've got a very thorough description of what they call the Windows XP reinstall. It's actually a reformat/installation. Spells out the disks needed and the order in which things need to be loaded. They do have some downloads available for drivers.

Good luck

[Chekhonte]

yeah, it's looking like it's going to be a huge pain in the ass. I might have better luck just buying an xp disk. I believe that if you try to us microsoft updates when you're using an illegal copy of XP, microsoft will tell you you're using an illegal copy of xp and offer to sell you a legit copy at a discount. I might just see if that's true.

[Dusty Chalk]

Going back to your original post:

I was just given a Dell Dimension 4600 computer and I fucked up. I wanted to reinstall XP but didn't have the OS disk from dell. I had the bright idea to use my OS disk from my compaq computer. It seemed to work until I realized that the compaq disk doesn't have the drivers for the video card, sound card and most importantly the ethernet or modem! I can't even go online to download the drivers because I can't use the ethernet port. Plus I have to activate it in 30 days.

Sounds like you just need the drivers.

Here's what I'd do: if I was hell bent on running XP, and I had no-one to help me (in my case, I'm fortunate enough to have an intarwebz-savvy housemate, or I could go to Hirsch for help), I'd get one of those Linux try-before-you-install disks, and use that to download the drivers.

Or just install linux and say fuck it to Microsoft. But I guess that depends on what you're going to use the computer for.

[JBLoudG20]

Or just install linux and say fuck it to Microsoft. But I guess that depends on what you're going to use the computer for.

Exactly how I feel. You want to play games, just work out your troubles with Windows. If you just type, listen to music, intarwebz: Linux may work for you.

But, I checked last night, and I no longer have my Dell disc. Sorry.

[Chekhonte]

I used my old computer to download the drivers and burned them to disk and installed them on my new computer. It's all working fine except that I can't register with MS without calling them.

I'll tell you what I'm NOT doing right now. I'm not downloading a corporate version of XP with service pack two right now and i"m not going to install it when it's finished.

I've had bad luck with Linux in the past. I needed for me to partition my hard drive and it locked up in the middle of that operation and wiped it entirely. I may give it another go but not any time soon.

[Ben Gramain]

All you have to do is to visit the Dell site, go to support and type in your service tag. Then provided the fitout hasn't changed, you'll get a list of drivers. Aside from that you can use any old XP disk - although if the drives are SATA you'll need SP2 CD.