What needs to be on my Checklist if I downgrade an HP laptop from Vista to XP?

[pcarbon02]

As I understand it, there are a couple hurdles before making the leap that I have come across so far.

I have a new HP G60T-200CTO. Specs are:

P7450 2.13 GHz Core 2 Duo
Wistron 3617 mainboard
WD Scorpio WD2500BEVT
Intel WiFi Link 5100
4GB Samsung PC2-6400
NVIDIA GeForce 9200M GE 256MB

Both HP and other forum members recommend backing up all files (of course) and creating recovery discs (in case the downgrade fails).

I was just looking for SATA drivers for my hard drive, a Western Digital Scorpio (WD2500BEVT) but couldn't find anything on the Western Digital website. Is there a general SATA driver I need instead?

I assume I may also need to find drivers for my burner and other devices, but I've read the SATA drivers are important since the OS Install Disc won't even detect a drive without them.

Any thoughts on what else I need on my "checklist" to do this downgrade?

 

[Billb2]

SATA drivers are native to all MS OSs since XP sp1.

You'll need ALL your other drivers though. Everything in Device manager.

 

[pcarbon02]

Is there any way to pull the existing drivers from the system that are under Device Manager? I am sure I can download some, but I dont know about ones like "Batteries -> Microsoft AC"

 

[Skitzer]

Wow ...... seriously dude ........ you need to leave Vista on the laptop.

 

[Trashman]

try searching google--->HP G60T 2nd listing is off of hp's website, you should have no problems looking for the Intel wireless driver.

 

[Trashman]

Originally posted by: Skitzer
Wow ...... seriously dude ........ you need to leave Vista on the laptop.

I don't get it either, but what ya going to do

 

[Billb2]

What they are trying to say it that there may not be any XP driver available for some of the devices in your laptop.
If HP never released them (ie never sold that laptop with XP) you'd have to find them somewhere else. Where else, who knows!
What you want to do is fraught with perilous assumptions.

And when you say you want to save your Vista drivers to reinstall them later under XP, well, that just scares people.

 

[pcarbon02]

Originally posted by: Billb2
What they are trying to say it that there may not be any XP driver available for some of the devices in your laptop.
If HP never released them (ie never sold that laptop with XP) you'd have to find them somewhere else. Where else, who knows!
What you want to do is fraught with perilous assumptions.

And when you say you want to save your Vista drivers to reinstall them later under XP, well, that just scares people.

Thank you Billb2, I hear you loud and clear. LOL Maybe I should heed everyone's advice and just stick with Vista haha

 

[Brainonska511]

Originally posted by: pcarbon02

Originally posted by: Billb2
What they are trying to say it that there may not be any XP driver available for some of the devices in your laptop.
If HP never released them (ie never sold that laptop with XP) you'd have to find them somewhere else. Where else, who knows!
What you want to do is fraught with perilous assumptions.

And when you say you want to save your Vista drivers to reinstall them later under XP, well, that just scares people.

Thank you Billb2, I hear you loud and clear. LOL Maybe I should heed everyone's advice and just stick with Vista haha

I don't know why you'd want to go to XP, you're computer is fast enough to have a positive Vista experience.

 

[pcarbon02]

Well I've been having a lot of issues with Vista freezing up. The thing that makes the least sense to me is that I have Task Manager open (and it usually still responds when Firefox or IE or AIM freezes) and it says I am using 3% or 5% CPU and 1.5GB - 2GB RAM (out of 4GB)

It didn't come with a lot of extra software. I have added a few programs and deleted others, but not a whole lot is on my system startup. I am running the following on startup

ZoneLabs Free Firewall
Avira Free
Truecrypt

 

[Mem]

Originally posted by: pcarbon02
Well I've been having a lot of issues with Vista freezing up. The thing that makes the least sense to me is that I have Task Manager open (and it usually still responds when Firefox or IE or AIM freezes) and it says I am using 3% or 5% CPU and 1.5GB - 2GB RAM (out of 4GB)

It didn't come with a lot of extra software. I have added a few programs and deleted others, but not a whole lot is on my system startup. I am running the following on startup

ZoneLabs Free Firewall
Avira Free
Truecrypt

I had a similar issue happen awhile back on one of my old XP PCs,turned out to be a hardware issue in my case,anyway run memtest86+ to test yor ram,if it passes I would probably think of doing a reformat and clean install of Vista,install software one at a time to see if its one of those software causing the problem,same with drivers too.

Anyway my guess is hardware or software/driver issue,99% sure it won't be Vista OS itself.