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  1. Default Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Bear with me, because I'm a bit ignorant when it comes up computers. Since Windows XP support was dropped, I was planning to upgrade to 7, and then I remembered that I have none of the drivers for the (very old) computer I use.

    The computer was given to me, and came with no discs. Before I was able to use it, I had to manually track down all the drivers I needed using my computer before it in order to get it to even connect to the internet. I expect I'll have to do this again when I install 7. Best part is, I HAD all the drivers saved in a folder in case I ever needed them again, but deleted it a couple months ago

    Is there a site out there that can help me find mandatory drivers? If I can't find that, I'll have to stick with XP until I can afford a new computer.

  2. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    how old is the machine

  3. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    >3 years. I'm starting to think I should just live with XP for a couple more months until I can afford a new machine, but security issues worry me.

  4. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    just wait and buy a new machine, I don't know if you have a rig powerful enough to run seven, xp was really lightweight compared to the features a lot of new operating systems have

  5. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Windows 7 has generic drivers for most hardware (network/display/sound/touchpad etc). If your computer is 3ish years old then your PC/component manufacturer should/could/would have drivers for your hardware regardless. A big worry I have about older PC's is the graphics card, however since your PC isn't too old your graphics card manufacturer will have a W7 driver, no need to worry about that.

    I see there being no reason why you should worry about upgrading. Be free child, be free of XP.

  6. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Drivers should be easy to find using google but it's a good point that your PC may not run W7 smoothly.

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    Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Meh.
    The computer i'm running right now is older than yours and runs 7 fine.

  8. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Oh jeez that site just made me cringe.

    There are thousands of websites that use buzz words like "driver" or "dll" and just bait and switch malware with the "drivers" they offer. If this site is legit they could have at least made it look legit, it looks no different from the malware infested websites on the net.

    On top of that, you have to download and install their program to update your drivers? Horrendous.

    What is so hard about just going to support.dell.com or whatever manufacturer you're privy to, to get your drivers?

  9. GLADIGATORS
    IGN: Overburnd
    Server: Khaini
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    usa

    Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Eh, nevermind. I knew about all that stuff already but it was fine when i used it. Maybe they updated and went rogue.

  10. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    You can use a program such as Double Driver to backup all your current drivers and restore them after you switch to W7.

  11. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Thanks, I'll keep track of that site in case I need it. Although, I've decided to just wait and get a new computer (Deal breaker is that the new one would want 64 bit, this could only run 32, and I'm not buying it twice or using an inferior version.) as this one is too terrible to warrant spending a penny on. Thanks for your input, everyone.

    Fun fact: My total RAM is 1 GB. That should give you some ideas of how old we're talking.

  12. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    W7 CAN run on 1GB but it would eat up a great deal of it with the OS alone.

    Also you can install 64 bit operating systems on machines with sub 4gb of RAM. 32 bit had the limiting factor of only going up to 4gb, not the other way around.

    (if you can pull the type of RAM you have, I can look at work in some of my older machines for free RAM in machines that we are recycling. Wouldn't hurt.)

  13. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    I am running Win 7 on 2 machines with only 1G of ram. No problems. And yes, I do run Maple on both of them (they suck at it, but it works for mules). You should be fine if you have a dual core or hyper-threading processor. (My two 1G machines are P4 HTs...)

  14. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    If you're sure about that, you've decided to cap the functionality of your machine at whatever state it is. If you decide to continue using it, it's a matter of making the most out of a bunch of hardware handicaps.

    I would slightly disagree with Zelkova in terms of Win7 RAM usage, since from personal experience, a clean installed Win7 would use about 300 MB of my old desktop with 1 GB RAM. I'm sure that number can be decreased with a bunch of safe tweaks to the system, which leaves about 70% or more RAM for whatever you need to run. Although that percentage may vary a bit due to some hardware discrepancies, I'd say that's pretty great for an old computer!

    Drivers are weird, and slightly depends on what you can live without. If you don't end up finding Win7 drivers for chipset, audio, video, and network drivers (like me =[ ), consider staying with XP.

    Maybe try Lubuntu if drivers and typical programs used will work with Linux. It's more memory efficient, I hear. Vista is evil, even with driver support. It'll be a downgrade from whatever you have right now.

    TLDR: Make the best of what you have, and abandon it later for newer stuff. That's life :D

  15. Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Oh no I agree. When Windows 7 came out I saw people running 7 on machines with Pentium 2 processors and 128mb of RAM (or something similar). I completely agree that he could install W7 no problem on this machine, I was just afraid that he would have to get used to the increased OS RAM consumption when compared to XP. It could be enough that he may not be able to, for example, run Skype and play MS at the same time.

  16. GLADIGATORS
    IGN: Overburnd
    Server: Khaini
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    usa

    Default Re: Planning to install windows 7... and then I remembered I have no driver discs.


    Unless he likes picture slide shows and spinning blue wheels that is

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