ASUS does not support XP??

[equalizeme]

I just installed Windows XP on the Aspire 5740G-6979 and I'm totallly unable to find the XP drivers for the Atheros AR928X wireless adapter on ASUS's website, even though apparently they've been created (See http://www.atheros.cz/) This seems VERY odd to me. Why would they not provide a link to drivers that exist? Is this because they would have to provide tech support?

Also, does anyone know where I can find these drivers? atheros.cz does not have anywhere that I can find to actually download the files...and I'm not sure I entirely trust the site to begin with.

Thanks!

 

[RebateMonger]

I had an Acer Nettop whose WiFi drivers didn't work correctly and no other drivers were available. I ended up finding another PC that used the same WiFi chip and downloading its XP drivers and installing them on my Acer.

 

[Fardringle]

Many manufacturers do not provide drivers for older operating systems in part because the systems (and components) were designed for a newer operating system but also because the manufacturer doesn't want to have to support older systems.

Having said that, it looks like this driver should work:
http://www.nodevice.com/driver/AR928X/get64223.html

 

[equalizeme]

Ahhh thanks so much I'll see if that does the trick!

 

[JackMDS]

Welcome to AnandTech Forums.

AFAIK at least one version of the following card was based on AR928x

Take a look here might be that the drivers that are offered will fit your card.

http://www.dlink.com/products/?tab=3&pid=DWL-G510&rev=DWL-G510

BTW this chipset is EOL and No body uses it for new card in the last few years.

Wireless cards are very inexpensive, you can find a wireless cards for old laptop with drivers for XP on ebay for about $10-$15

 

[equalizeme]

Fardringle: That worked! I'm amazed that ASUS made me go through this much work... they could have simply put the driver on their website and stated that it was not supported. I just love the fact that I bought a new computer only to have to install XP on it because it didn't come with Windows Professional. Sigh.

Jack: I'm kind of glad it's out of date... otherwise I might not have been able to find XP drivers for it!

 

[xSauronx]

Fardringle: That worked! I'm amazed that ASUS made me go through this much work... they could have simply put the driver on their website and stated that it was not supported.

if its on the website, people will expect it to be supported. kinda like another thread recently bitching about HP or some damn vendor because they wouldnt say XP would work on a server blah blah...if i didnt want to support something, i definitely would not give anyone the impression that i would know anything about it.

 

[Fardringle]

I'm glad it worked for you.

 

[Nothinman]

Awesome, I wish more manufacturers would start making it difficult/impossible to support XP.

 

[xSauronx]

Awesome, I wish more manufacturers would start making it difficult/impossible to support XP.

Ive got an internship at a large area hospital and Im on the Upgrade team....the Windows XP Upgrade team.

7000+ workstations and we run into hardware and software from time to time that has nonexistant or spotty support for anything post w2k (which is what things had been running)

and *you* wish xp wasnt supported...some days I wish it didnt exist

/high-end sheet-fed scanners with SCSI cards are the WORST

 

[Modelworks]

I had an intel motherboard that has vista and 7 drivers but no xp support, so not surprising.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Awesome, I wish more manufacturers would start making it difficult/impossible to support XP.

That's just a little mean-sprited towards end-users, don't you think?

 

[Nothinman]

That's just a little mean-sprited towards end-users, don't you think?

Maybe, the software is a almost a decade old and those end-users have explicitly opted out of not 1 but 2 major upgrades. They made their choice.

And most, if not all, XP users would benefit immensely from upgrading to Win7. Software is more akin to milk than scotch, it gets much, much worse over time instead of better.

 

[Fardringle]

And most, if not all, XP users would benefit immensely from upgrading to Win7. Software is more akin to milk than scotch, it gets much, much worse over time instead of better.

Not necessarily. Windows 7 runs VERY badly on older computers, so people who have no reason to upgrade their computer not only have no good reason to upgrade the OS but also have a very good reason to not upgrade.

There are many applications which simply will not run in Vista or Win7. Companies that rely on this software for their business operations also have a very good reason to not upgrade.

 

[Modelworks]

Not necessarily. Windows 7 runs VERY badly on older computers, so people who have no reason to upgrade their computer not only have no good reason to upgrade the OS but also have a very good reason to not upgrade.

There are many applications which simply will not run in Vista or Win7. Companies that rely on this software for their business operations also have a very good reason to not upgrade.

How old are the computers ? I have run 7 on 1GB ram and a single core 2ghz p4 and it works fine.

Which applications do not run on win7 ? They have to be really old, 16 bit old.

 

[xSauronx]

How old are the computers ? I have run 7 on 1GB ram and a single core 2ghz p4 and it works fine.

Which applications do not run on win7 ? They have to be really old, 16 bit old.

my netbook runs windows 7 pro well enough, not great, but well enough. people who use really old computers likely arent updating and dealing with modern software on a regular basis, to be realistic.

as far as business goes...again at work were just now going to XP. Some machines are rather old (old dell optiplex gx260, 270s and 280s that will be on the replacement list in the next year or so) and probably wouldnt handle windows 7 very well. Some medical software likely also wouldnt work, or at least, wouldnt be officially supported.

Theyre planning on researching the upgrade to 7, as well as a newer version of Novell Groupwise and Xen desktop manager among other things as soon as the XP upgrade is finished at the end of the summer, but theres no telling when that will get rolled out (id be surprised if they started before new years)

 

[ZXT]

How old are the computers ? I have run 7 on 1GB ram and a single core 2ghz p4 and it works fine.

Which applications do not run on win7 ? They have to be really old, 16 bit old.

I agree, I'm running 7 on a P4 machine (2.4ghz) with 1GB ram and it runs smooth until now (5 months and counting)

 

[Nothinman]

Not necessarily. Windows 7 runs VERY badly on older computers, so people who have no reason to upgrade their computer not only have no good reason to upgrade the OS but also have a very good reason to not upgrade.

There are many applications which simply will not run in Vista or Win7. Companies that rely on this software for their business operations also have a very good reason to not upgrade.

I call shenanigans. I installed Win7 on my old, work notebook and it definitely runs better than XP did. You'd need an incredibly anemic machine for Win7 to run worse than XP.

And the only software that's given me any issues is specialized stuff from Cisco, which I'm not even sure they managed to create the issues they did since it's all Java and doesn't do anything special on the host you run it from.

 

[equalizeme]

Maybe, the software is a almost a decade old and those end-users have explicitly opted out of not 1 but 2 major upgrades. They made their choice.

And most, if not all, XP users would benefit immensely from upgrading to Win7. Software is more akin to milk than scotch, it gets much, much worse over time instead of better.

If you think I'm choosing Win XP because I want to, think again. I'm choosing XP because the hardware I _need_ to use for my profession is incompatible with Windows 7. The user base is so small, that the company that provides support will probably be supporting Windows 7 in the next ten years.

So far, I have everything working but the sound drivers. I even have a hacked video driver that some guy put together from another manufacturer's driver package.

Now I come to find out that I could have run VMWare this whole time... I might just go and reinstall Windows Home Premium again.

But thank you for your kind words as I struggle to get this to work.

 

[JackMDS]

If you think I'm choosing Win XP because I want to, think again. I'm choosing XP because the hardware I _need_ to use for my profession is incompatible with Windows 7.

In such case there is Huge amount of Laptops that are fully compatible with Win XP, and can be found around for about $100-$150 (I sold few in the last few monthes in mint condition with WinXP fully installed on them.

When it is really important functional solution is called for rather than "endless complaining". :hmm:

 

[Nothinman]

If you think I'm choosing Win XP because I want to, think again. I'm choosing XP because the hardware I _need_ to use for my profession is incompatible with Windows 7. The user base is so small, that the company that provides support will probably be supporting Windows 7 in the next ten years.

So far, I have everything working but the sound drivers. I even have a hacked video driver that some guy put together from another manufacturer's driver package.

Now I come to find out that I could have run VMWare this whole time... I might just go and reinstall Windows Home Premium again.

But thank you for your kind words as I struggle to get this to work.

All I can say to that is I'm glad my paychecks aren't locked into a single, incompetent vendor like that.

 

[Fardringle]

Quite a few of the individuals I work with are retired on a fixed income. Many of them still use computers that were built well over 10 years ago. Their computers still work perfectly and do everything that they need to do (email their grandchildren) so there is absolutely no reason to upgrade. I did install Windows7 on one of them (a P2-300) just for kicks and got a Windows Experience Index score of 0 since it couldn't finish the test. This was after it took about 15 minutes to finish booting Windows. I realize that this is an extreme example, but MANY people have old computers simply because they don't have any need for the newest and fastest as long as what they have still works.


As for software, I'll give one example since I don't feel like writing a book.

The most widely used management software for insurance agencies is called TAM. TAM will not run at all in Windows7 and only partially after a lot of headache in Windows Vista. This is in part because of stupid programming by the software developers but also because of the way that Vista and Win7 treat running applications. There is no other reasonable alternative for these insurance agencies to use so they cannot switch to Vista/Win7 even if they wanted to.

On the same line...many medical scanners and other equipment have very specific software/OS requirements in order to run properly. I worked recently on a computer that monitors an MRI machine for a local hospital. The computer is running Windows 95 because the monitoring system will not function in a newer Windows environment. It sounds crazy, but when you consider that the options are to either continue using Windows 95 or spend a few million dollars for a new MRI when the old one still works perfectly, it's a pretty easy choice.

 

[Nothinman]

Quite a few of the individuals I work with are retired on a fixed income. Many of them still use computers that were built well over 10 years ago. Their computers still work perfectly and do everything that they need to do (email their grandchildren) so there is absolutely no reason to upgrade

Of course there's a reason to upgrade, security. The fact that they have a fixed income means they should be more worried about protecting their credit card numbers, bank information, etc. If spending a couple of hundred dollars on a cheap machine at Best Buy is out of the question maybe you should be moving them to Linux. They'll get free upgrades for the rest of their life and the hardware requirements stay pretty static.

This is in part because of stupid programming by the software developers but also because of the way that Vista and Win7 treat running applications.

What is the problem with the way Vista and win7 treat running apps?

On the same line...many medical scanners and other equipment have very specific software/OS requirements in order to run properly. I worked recently on a computer that monitors an MRI machine for a local hospital. The computer is running Windows 95 because the monitoring system will not function in a newer Windows environment. It sounds crazy, but when you consider that the options are to either continue using Windows 95 or spend a few million dollars for a new MRI when the old one still works perfectly, it's a pretty easy choice.

That's just pure incompetence and/or greed on the part of the company producing the software. As soon as the sales people said the words "Windows 95" they should've been escorted out of the medical facility.

 

[equalizeme]

That's just pure incompetence and/or greed on the part of the company producing the software. As soon as the sales people said the words "Windows 95" they should've been escorted out of the medical facility.

Assuming it's incompetence is incorrect. Medical hardware/software has a very limited target market/installed user base. When I say the hardware I'm using is incompatible with Windows 7, it's not that they're not working on fixing it--it's that it was designed for Windows XP 32 bit. I don't think it's a Windows 7 problem as much as it's a 64-bit problem.

If you have a user base of 500-1000 people, 90% of which run Vista or XP, then you're not going to have bugs being reported to you until people start to upgrade. Most of the people only use their computers for work, so the version of the OS doesn't necessarily matter to them, as they won't be browsing the web.

Anyway I didn't mean to start a debate, I just want to fix the problem. I'm going to try to reinstall Windows 7 and then VMWare and see if that works.

 

[RebateMonger]

Which applications do not run on win7 ? They have to be really old, 16 bit old.

They don't have to be that old. AutoCAD 2010 and earlier, for instance, have issues with Windows 7. AutoCAD won't support AutoCAD 2009 or earlier running Win7. That's important when you've spent thousands of dollars on software for your business.

Windows 7 Support for AutoCAD :
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=14056350&linkID=9240617

Known Limitations with Windows 7 for AutoCAD and AutoCAD-based Products:
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=14056444&linkID=9240617

I was warned, in particular, of issues when running AutoCAD 2008 and earlier with Windows 7. The biggest CAD distributor in Arizona told me, "you'll have problems".

As you can imagine, this makes it a bit difficult to recommend Windows 7 to a client (like mine) who's running AutoCAD 2008. Right now, when they need a new PC, we get Dells with XP Professional pre-installed and licenses/disks for Windows 7 Professional if/when they decide to upgrade.