Windows 7 on Latitude E6400

Hmm. Turns out the driver cd has a x64 directory and a id folder, and in there the driver for the disk drive shows up. Would be nice if they named it something more friendly.

 

are you trying to upgrade? or doing a clean installation? Also, have you reformatted and deleted the partition (if you are clean-installing)? there arent any drivers you need to install during the win7 install.

 

have you bothered to try installing as administrator? I just tried that and it works fine. If you are generally having installation problems, there is a known bug and fix for that, let me know.

 

Make sure you have the latest BIOS from Dell installed too.

 

Yeah, I tried installing as administrator. I simply switched off wireless, installed, switched it on again.
Now it's running just fine. Thanks anyways!

 

I installed it from http://picasa.google.com/ no issues at all on Win 7 7000 x64.

 

anyone else noticing erroneously low cpu usage reports? (running firefox (26 tabs), thunderbird, ms one note, pidgin, sym endpoint prot av, etc.) it is reporting CPU usage bouncing between 0-3%, occasionally jumping to 5-6%.

 

This is absolutely normal.
ANY actual PC OS is like this. JUST the fact showing you the level of the CPU will increase the level of the CPU usage.
Moreover, you have the OS that needs to do some call check to make sure your application and its own processes are still alive. Then you have the OS task schedule (OS update, detect new monitor/bluetooth (if you have it)/ sync time, check battery level, networking stuff, etc...), self maintenance system.

No mater what full OS on your PC you use... this will be case. If it is not.. then it lies or your system freezed.

 

no, thats the point. the odds of it actually being around 0% with that many programs open and active is about well... zero. it should be using MORE, im not saying it is using a lot.

i am saying i think it is misreporting the usage, because i find it hard to believe that it remained that low.

 

Pardon my ignorance; I just discovered this forum and just completed reading all of the posts in this thread.

I just received my E6400 from the Dell Outlet; it's a refurbished unit that came with just about every option, including 8 GB of RAM and a 250 GB 7,200 RPM drive. It came with Vista Business *32-bit* (go figure) installed and with Vista *Home* *32-bit* (again, go figure) media. Dell is sending me Vista Business 64-bit media.

I have three questions...

1. I was planning to wipe the drive and install the Vista 64-bit version--using the 64-bit media that Dell is sending me or using my own licensed copy of Vista Ultimate 64-bit. Considering how much work is involved with installing Vista 64-bit, however (at least, according to Dell's web site and GKDesigns' post listed earlier in this thread), I'm wondering if I should install the Windows 7 beta instead. Any suggestions? Regardless, I plan to install the Windows 7 RTM when it is released and when Dell provides official support for it with this model.

2. If I were to install the Windows 7 beta (as a clean install), where would I download the drivers referred to in this message? And for what operating system...Vista 64-bit?

3. When the Windows 7 beta (Build 7000) was made available some weeks ago, I only downloaded the 32-bit edition; is the 64-bit edition available for download anywhere? Of course, RC1 is supposed to be available within the next few weeks.

Thanks!