Post #130,789
12/15/03 4:55:06 AM
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Ridding a Dell 4400 of XP..
Didn't find much help re the general idea - in a few unfocussed Googles. Surely there be millions? of us retros - many of whom acquire or seek later model iron - sans the post-9x M$ almost-closed bear trap of snoopware, or that egregious interim Win-MErde.
OK.. so someone gave an operating 'Dimension 4400' P-4 1.7 GHz (256M DDR) box to a friend - sans a (removed bad HD w/some salvaged data). {sigh} Here I am in bed again with Two major nemeses: Dell & Billy.
The Restore disk is probably obtainable, but I do NOT want to acquire XP ductape / dejunk lore <--> and ya can't throw away something working this well! Then too, the new owner ain't about to do any Linux reformatting of brain.. ergo
Has anyone rolled-back this scourge, too - Dell or otherwise? This machine was spawned in 5/02; Dunno when 98-SE was sprung - '99?
Am I missing something in supposing that most of the driver makers would have wanted to peddle their new toy accessories - also to 98 users who won't go Ex Pee? [Now as to mobo makers .?.]
Tests thus far:
Romped through this utterly dumbed-down BIOS. Dell doesn't even mention that 'A05' is really AMI of 3/14/02. Found PnP disabled. Enabled it.
New HD: SpinRited.
Ran Knoppix - it flies and autodetects / IDs the GeForce 2, 3? ti 200 card as 'NV11' in x-window speak, I guess. Unlike Doze, Linux also found the sound as "Intel 18280 820 Carino2? AC-97". Neither found the Ethernet card or modem. (Such archaic stuff! BTW, in the Bootlog Ethernet test repertoire of '98!)
No surprises on install; but a minute or two was spent "Installing 'non-PnP hardware found'". As anticipated, with trepidation:
1) Got default vga driver, stuck at 640x480; shades of S-3 trio ca 1995.
2) Unaware of any audio. (And Knop. plays only softly through it.. more subtle problem?)
3) Or modem - WTF could Dell have massaged in specs to Bangladeshis.. to hide a vanilla lo-bid Winmodem?
4) some ?s in Device Manager included "Unknowns" as accord with the undetected items -- but also: an ominous "PCI System Management Bus" entry, apparently sans its driver, too. :(
Found a Uni-(all models-in-one) Nvidia 8 Mbyte! driver set, and a sound assemblage reputed to cover all 8xx Intel / sound chips, codecs etc. NVidia per usual - no brainer, and gorgeous gam(ma)s.
Intel's "sound" collection apparently failed to ID this exact audio but it fixed the major PCI Sys Mgmt Bus thingie, and installed drivers for 3 or 4 other mobo bus accessories, a bridge or two.
(Fun to romp through the 98-lite .inf files.. see those reams of command- deleted detritus somehow hooked to IE or AOL or - the usual adcrap)
OK it's fun to tilt at Corp-windmills.. for a while. Next ugly chore: a &*%# 18 MEGAbyte Roxio update! .. just to get coverage of the later Sony CRX71 CD/RW. (DirectCD or equiv. is as essential as tabbed browsing)
I think.. I've saved this Dell from XP. The fine Hayes Optima on serial port obviates the need for futzing with Winmodem, and don't need eth0.
ie SCREW >YOU< MichaelBilly!
<cackle>
Ashton
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Post #130,895
12/15/03 5:56:21 PM
12/15/03 6:00:02 PM
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Getting rid of XP and using Linux
Go here:
[link|http://support.dell.com/filelib/Devices.aspx?Category=0&OS=LNUX+&OSL=EN&SvcTag=&SysID=DIM_PNT_P4_4400|http://support.dell....D=DIM_PNT_P4_4400]
If that link doesn't work try going to [link|http://www.dell.com/|http://www.dell.com/] and pick customer support, home user, downloads, and choose your model Dimesion 4400, and then Linux for the OS.
To determine the hardware on the Dell, you may have to use some form of Windows to run the control to scan your hardware. Unless there is a way to give them the service tag and they can tell from that.
Or you can go here and enter the service tag:
[link|https://support.dell.com/productselection.aspx|https://support.dell...uctselection.aspx]
Then do a search on Linux or whatever OS you want to install. Download the drivers to a different machine with a CDR drive and burn them to the CDR. Use 4X speed burn to ensure the drive will be able to read it.
BTW IIRC Windows 98 came out in 98, SE was the first service pack for it. 98 Support ends in two months, or so I am told.
I wasn't clear if you wanted 98 or Linux or both, or whatever on the machine. Entering the service tag, it can be found on the back of the system box, will tell the Dell search what hardware the system has. Do a search on 98, Linux or whatever OS you are trying to install and grab the drivers for that OS.
"Lady I only speak two languages, English and Bad English!" - Corbin Dallas "The Fifth Element"
Edited by orion
Dec. 15, 2003, 06:00:02 PM EST
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Post #130,950
12/16/03 7:04:14 AM
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Thanks,
good tip on using the service tag # --
Indeed tag # does give a range of configs . Turns out even, there is a Win 98 set of several drivers; apparently some of these were ordered sans XP (though Dell droids would not ever volunteer such). Have to sleuth elsewhere for modem; not ID'd.
Plan is for 98SE-lite use. (Nice that it runs Knoppix fast, but irrelevant to this user)
Config. is kinda like building a house of cards...
Ashton
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Post #131,000
12/16/03 12:30:47 PM
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You are welcome
Modems are cheap these days. You can get a Lucent chipset Winmodem for $20USD these days.
If the modem is on a PCI card, take a look at the FCC-ID and then do a search on it.
[link|http://www.fcc.gov/oet/fccid/|http://www.fcc.gov/oet/fccid/]
It will tell you the company that made it.
See if you can figure out what the part number is for the card, and get it from the OEM that made it for Dell.
I used to have to do that for people who bought Gateway and Packard Bell systems that lost their driver disks and had the hard drive crash on them. Most Packard Bell cards were Reveal or Aztec audio cards, etc. I used to have a Geocities Reveal Windows 95 site with the drivers I collected because Reveal was out of business.
"Lady I only speak two languages, English and Bad English!" - Corbin Dallas "The Fifth Element"
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Post #130,897
12/15/03 6:11:37 PM
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Re: Ridding a Dell 4400 of XP..
If it's on NTFS you'll have to start over.
It would be better to start over anyway. Downgrades are just not possible if you want a reliable result.
-drl
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Post #130,899
12/15/03 6:25:53 PM
12/15/03 6:27:06 PM
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Nothing to see...
It's dangerous to skim an Ashton post. Even more dangerous to reply!
Cheers,
Scott.
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Post #130,945
12/16/03 4:27:06 AM
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Umm: new HD
"Downgrade" (with a new HD - fdisk, clean install) means: possibly the hardware was never tested on <Ex Pee; certainly no Dell droid would even hint at the possibility it would run. In fact: it does (so far).
Nothing to lose, trying - while possibly escaping the agony of arranging all the logstics with XP so as never to visit the Update site, then close all the (new) loopholes. ie, for me - acquiring new Doze lore I'd rather not acquire.
A.
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Post #130,900
12/15/03 6:32:30 PM
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XP might be bad...
...but Windows 98 is worse. Much worse.
In fact, I'd go so far as to say that if you want to run Windows 98, then you deserve everything you get. It's shit.
Peter
[link|http://www.debian.org|Shill For Hire]
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
[link|http://guildenstern.dyndns.org|Blog]
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Post #130,903
12/15/03 6:46:06 PM
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Re: XP might be bad...
The only factor would be marginal hardware, 98 would be better on anything less than 128Mb RAM.
I've never tried XP on low hardware - what's the minimum practical? Comparable to 2k?
-drl
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Post #130,942
12/16/03 3:22:52 AM
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XP is fine in 128MB
If you turn off the tellytubby interface doin's. It'll be satisfactory for simple web/email work.
For real work, bung a gig in the box :-)
Disclaimer: I have no less than 512MB in any machine at home ;)
Peter
[link|http://www.debian.org|Shill For Hire]
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
[link|http://guildenstern.dyndns.org|Blog]
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Post #131,002
12/16/03 12:34:31 PM
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Turning off unneeded services in XP
Follow Black Viper's advice:
Read this one first:
[link|http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm|http://www.blackvipe...XP/servicecfg.htm]
Then this one:
[link|http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/supertweaks.htm|http://www.blackvipe...P/supertweaks.htm]
There are features and services that are optional with XP, they can be disabled or turned off.
I ran XP Pro in 128M with a 700Mhz Celeron, it ran, but not as fast with a system with more RAM. I had to turn stuff off to get a performance boost.
"Lady I only speak two languages, English and Bad English!" - Corbin Dallas "The Fifth Element"
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Post #130,946
12/16/03 4:50:01 AM
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In eye of beholder.
Natch I know better than to argue Doze lore with a Jediaded Master, and if you are speaking of the whole range of arduos aps (PhotoShop, dev, gaming, multiple behemoth aps etc.) -- doubtless you are right; even I accept the scuttlebutt that 2K is more "stable" than 9.x - and XP > 2K. That said,
I place minimal demands (for my own use); it is easy for me to treat it as the glass-fragile POS it pretty much is. Ditto re owner of this box, who would have trouble dealing with the added complexity of even 2K. Whether due to the original dejunking of 98-lite, or via regular culling of Reg. crap, etc .. I've never had to reload since my careful install on e-Machine, in 7/01. (Nor does 98 suffer the creeping internal molasses reputed of many MErde installs)
V. rare non-Moz-related crashes, and quite few of those.
So I'll go with a familiar POS, stripped naked - to the spy-prone latest; rely upon firewall to keep it from the daily cruelties of a million packets of Billy-aimed malice.
Ashton
would prefer a Cisitalia to a Maybach, too ;-)
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Post #130,951
12/16/03 7:12:39 AM
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Why the hell...
...aren't you running Linux, Ash?
Peter
[link|http://www.debian.org|Shill For Hire]
[link|http://www.kuro5hin.org|There is no K5 Cabal]
[link|http://guildenstern.dyndns.org|Blog]
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Post #131,602
12/19/03 8:41:51 PM
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Prefer Wallace & Gromit fun____;-)
{sigh}
Hey.. had my best efforts to dejunk 98 proved futile.. I'd have had no choice, 2 years ago and with the then state/art of maybe-installs amongst the unwashed.
(Though when that G-4 showed up last year..)
Similar reasons for not even attempting to grok W2K Server (with its NT-core, myriad of services, many to be stopped; infinitely non-synergistic nested menus - with an illogic only Billy's droids could invent). In that case too, the early question "..and if I grok this fully - of what future Use shall it avail moi?" answered itself.
In fact I do boot Knoppix periodically, absorb a bit more arcanery, when in a masochistic mood. It IS impressive. Will follow with periodic interest, a friend's adventures with a recent Mandrake distro (noting if/when he drops the training wheels and becomes Debianized: the clear Mensch-model of logical niceness and, I'm betting - longevity of org ;-)
Hey.. he's got networking pretty much working, despite many blank spots in the Why department: Good Sign. (In fact - I used Knoppix to ID some stuff in this Dell, which Doze weaseled on, with familiar refrain, Unknown Device cha cha cha.)
I know it sounds dumbthish, not to go with the Obv. superior mode - but, for *your* mien and also daily bread earner: the arcanery remains still er fascinating - thus you don't even notice the vastness of material you have adsorbed, in order to reach your max typing-speed, at the cli. I OTOH merely toyed with assembly language.. and rarely from fascination.
(But I have done that trip several times, only just not ever \ufffd-related. My enthusiasms lie elsewhere.)
Ex: just acquired a couple specimens of a v-fast pulse generator (Tek 284) made in '70s and using a rather hi-current [24 mA] TD (tunnel diode: today pure Unobtainium, as the fabs no longer exist). It does mind-numbing clever things.. both in the mechanical layout incorporating a small waveguide, and in the use of reflections (VSWR) to synergistically steepen the Risetime: to under 70 PICOseconds! Software is .. well .. Different, y'know?
Look: *nix is no less complex in the guts than Doze, just smarter, more stable, more logical to pursue to its roots: all while nicely open to the inquisitive.
I'll likely settle for some Pro install magic [now if.. I owned this Dell box], help with certain choices - and cookbook the weekly ap-get (so many useful switches, there) for maintenance.
When I have all the few functions I need, minimal or 0 networking: Then! I shall be elated to finally crush the Billyboxen, ceremoniously immolating same with a few hydrocarbons added. With pix against the night sky / full moon.
Maybe with remote monitor and the sucker 'running': note at what temp it blue-screens < blank. Get a Reporter over, put it in the local Kenwood Gazette. (They run Apple, there.. ;-)
HTH to explain that quality often called *reluctance* (or sloth)
Ashton
Gooo ---> Debian;
Me watch a bit more
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Post #131,603
12/19/03 8:55:59 PM
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Mission accomplished.
Now undergoing hammering.
All guts ID'd and indeed there are drivers. (Even for the unused NIC). No more ?s. Even the faux-modem screams at 52K logon.
So yes: a 5/02 lump of lo-bid commodity hardware w/ Intel guts, GeForce can accommodate the mediocre side-valve engine of a dejunked 98SE-lite:
boots rapidly, shuts down in ~ 1.5 sec. So-far accommodates the basic needs of Acrobat 4, Moz 1.5, utilities and maybe Utra-Edit + spellcheck (for this user) in lieu of any silly Office Suite. Updated Roxio 5.3x has the DirectCD infinite floppy going on this later CDRW. 'Stealth' to the prof. port testing folk. (This week, anyway)
..and someday, maybe it'll be my 1st official *nix box.
Ashton
Nice.. when this shit Works.
But.. tedious, man
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