DELL XPS 17 L702x Clean Install

Hi.

Firstly I'm sorry If such post already exist. Was trying to find it , but couldn't

I have just few question.
What should be the correct order to install drivers on XPS, after Win7 clean install? Can I use drivers disc provided by Dell to do it? Or rather download them...?

And as with my System I got Microsoft Office and Mac Affee,
could anybody tell me where can I download those applications from?
And after I download them , I just have to use information provided by DELL to make for instance Microsoft Office Business Genuine?

Thank you,
again sorry if such post already exist!

 

Google "my dell downloads" and follow the instructions, to get to DELL download site.You will be able to download MacAfee, PowerDVD and a bunch of DELL apps but I did not see Office there.

For the drivers, I downloaded first the newer ones from DELL site.It may be easyer to use DELL CD and update the drivers after, as for a few devices I did not have an instal, only the driver and INF and I had to use device manager to get the driver installed (but maybe I missed something).

 

Forget McAfee it sucks!

MALWAREBYTES, AVIRA, Microsoft Security Essentials - free anti-virus programs "that work"

imgburn - free - burns cd dvd without problems and bloat

vlc videolan media player - free - plays everything

ccleaner - free

You really do not need to do a clean install as you can clean up the current install.

I have fast boot times for years and the trick is to know how (read research) to keep it running fast ; ) As you do not need to reinstall the OS everytime the computer slows! Rather learn and fix what is causing the slowness!

 

Microsoft Office,

Dell does not and will not provide any type of installation media for Office. They will instruct you to go online and download the free trial on Microsofts office web site, and use the key code provide with your XPS. This does work, but like most people who pay almost $200 for software you want a install DISK.
The only way to get a install disk is to purchace one from the Microsoft Store. They call it a back up disk on there web site. I could not find it directly so i called there order line. The part # for Microsoft Office home and buisiness 2010 32/64 bit editions is TSD-000436 at a cost of $14.95 plus shipping.

Dell will not tell you about the microsoft store, they dont have a clue !!!

XPS L702x
Intell 2820QM
Nvidia 555M 3G. plus TV tuner
8 Gigs Ram

 

Thanks for replies, I guess will have to download trial and use the KEY...
Just one more thing, what about those drivers?
for instance, under Drivers and Downloads, there is "Communication".
And like 7 diff drivers.

It's so annoying , as I don't want to install drivers that I don't need. And they don't make it easy

 

When doing a fresh install, driver installation order does make a difference. If done in the proper order, things tend to be less stressful.

Here is my suggestion:

1. Confirm you have BIOS A08 installed.

2. Install Windows 7 x64

3. Once the Windows install is complete and you are on the desktop, start with the most important driver first, the HM67 chipset: Chipset 1

Now... I do the rest in this order:

A. SATA Management SATA-II/III

B. USB 3.0 USB 3.0 Board

C: Intel HECI Management HECI

D. Motion Sensor Freefall Sensor

E. Touchpad TouchPad

F. ALC665 Audio Audio

G. If you do not have the 3D system, install the Intel HD video first Intel Video ...then the Nvidia driver Nvidia 550/555
If you have the 3D compatible system, install ONLY the Nvidia driver (first), then install the Nvidia 3D emitter driver 3D emitter

H. HD webcam Dell HD webcam

I. Gigabit ethernet LAN

J. Wifi card (this driver supports most Intel cards offered with the L702x) Intel WLAN. If you have the Intel 6230, now install the Bluetooth 3.0 Intel 6230 BT3.0

K. Lastly, the Quickset driver Quickset x64

Note: It seems Dell does not have the media card reader/writer driver listed when I looked so it is attached below. It can be installed at any time as it is not critical.

At this point, you should have all the important devices working and your system will be wanting to get its Windows updates, etc. Once all this is done, you can add any additional drivers and/or software for anything additional you may have or want such as the Intel wireless display (non-3D systems only), TV module (if purchased), webcam software, audio upgrade software, face recognition software, DVD/Blu-ray software, etc.

* If installing the face recognition software, make sure the webcam central software is installed first or you may have some "switching" issues.

Hope this helps.

Scott-

 

Thanks Scott, I am thinking of calling Dell regarding the burning sensation from using the palm rest.

 

Thank you! That what I was waiting for Will try all that shortly. THX again Scott

 

Hey Scott,

Many thanks for taking the time to type out and link to all of the needed drivers. I too am going to do a fresh install once I get my SSD so your post will come in very, very handy.

 

+1 Well said!

 

Hi,
I just performed a clean install. When I run disk defragmenter an unknown drive appears in the window - see pic below.
1) Can anybody explain what this is?
2) Does this only appear when you perform a clean install? What about your system?
3) How can I get rid of it?
Thanks!

 

Did you wipe the whole drive before install?

There were 3 partitions on my hdd Win7 OS & the extra bit plus a Dell backup partition. I deleted all of them and formatted the whole drive before installing the OS again.

 

How exactly do you install this driver, sorry for the noob-like question however I've never installed a driver that isn't a .inf or .exe.

 

Download and then unzip the drivers (doesn't matter where). Insert a memory card and your system will try to install the drivers. It will succesfully install one of 4 drivers on it's own. Go to your system device manager and you willl now see three "unknown" devices. Update the drivers (right click) and point it to wherever you unzipped the files (drivers)...

 

Used this checklist and everything went pretty much flawless once I did the SSD registry tweak. I am now left with one "unknown device" on PCI bus 0, device 31, function 3. Any ideas at all??

 

Sure you installed this?

Drivers and Downloads

 

Yessir - I just checked again to be sure and it's installed. Everything seems to be working but the ADD part of me hates those notifications.

 

What about card reader software it should be on the driver disk. If that's not it go to the intel website and download the latest intel inf update and install.

 

Yep, that's installed too. I cannot figure it out...

 

Download this:

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Det...t*&DownloadType=Utilities, Tools and Examples

 

Bingo! That did the trick! So, what was it??? (and a BIG thank you!)!

 

The missing component had something to do with the intel chipset, I believe temperature monitoring or something.

Cheers

Dave

 

Is it necessary to install DirectX after installing nVidia drivers?

Thanks.

 

Any games you may play will install it otherwise here is the latest version.

Download DirectX 9.0c (Jun 10) - FileHippo.com

 

thx for the info !!

 

I received my XPS 17 from FedEX today pretty early in the day. I'm finally getting a chance to play with it! I tested the webcam and played a blu-ray, so I'm guessing that's all I really needed to see if things work. The colors look "fine" to me, but the AG is nice. I also created the Dell Backup/Recovery when I first started my laptop, it only took 2 dvds.

Anyways, I'm doing a clean install and I'm not familiar w/ dealing w/ Partitions. I booted the laptop thru the recovery cd I ordered (yes, I spent the $10 before reading the forums...) and I'm at the screen asking me where I want to install WIndows. I have the options to Delete, Format, and Extend my Disks.

So basically, my question is what can I Format and Delete? I ordered the 1 TB HD (2x500), so I know that Disk 0 is my C: Drive and Disk 1 is my D: Drive.

Disk 0 Partition 1 - 101.0 MB - 92.0MB free - OEM (Reserved)
Disk 0 Parition 2: RECOVERY - 14.6GB - 6.7GB free - System
Disk 0 Partition 3: OS - 451.0 GB - 417.6GB free - Primary
Disk 1 Partition 1 - 465.8 GB - 465.7GB free - Primary

 

When I Reformatted I wiped both HDD's and ended up wit hthe 100MB partition that Windows installed, and two empty Disk Drives.

it's up to you if you want to keep the recovery partition.

 

There is no mention of installing Dell System Software. Is this not needed? And what does it do anyway?

Thanks

Martin

 

My focus was on a clean install with the system drivers only. Optional software, including the Dell software tweaks you reference are optional and not required. Additional third party software for DVD, webcam, and/or audio are the choice of the laptop owner.

Scott-

 

Thanks for replying Scott. Will skip the software then.

Martin

 

Is it important to do a clean install? I was thinking of just doing add remove programs and cleaning everything out that way? Would a clean install make a big difference in performance? Sorry if its a noob question.

 

Well I've done the clean out crap programs, disable things on startup, clean out extra registry keys game before. It took more time to do that then it did to do a total clean install. And the clean install ran leaner still. It is real easy to do the clean format right out of the box.

For reference, my XPS 17 came with 92 processes running OUT OF THE BOX. I did a clean format, installed a bunch of stuff, including Steam, Skype, and so on, and am only running ~80 processes at idle.

I tried the clean out on my sister's Inspiron last summer. I knocked over 20 processes off the thing with removing bloatware and such, but spent a couple hours doing it. I ended up having to do a clean format anyway a day later, and after rebuilding and adding all her stuff it was about 40 processes less than the out-of-the-box state.

You just have to spend too much time cleaning stuff out to make it worth it to me. I've done a lot of re-installs over the years and it takes me only about 1-2 hours now on a fresh system. If I were to image things, it would be even less.

And the fresh install guarantees that only the stuff you installed is in there, whereas if you remove programs, even if you manually go into the registry there tend to be parts of the program remaining, and possibly causing issues later.

To answer the question, it has made a LARGE performance difference in my experience, and I am not referring solely to having fewer processes. It just runs better too.

 

Thank you so much, tells me everything I need to know!

I'm going to give a clean install a go. I'm just updating my BIOS now and will follow Scott's step by step guide.

Just one question. Where do I get a clean copy of Win 7 Professional from? I did a google and it kept coming up with torrent stuff and hacks.

I've found the thread on here about legal windows 7 downloads and i'm reading that at the moment to see if that is the way forward for me.... its going to be a long night lol!

 

You should be able to get it from Dell. If you didn't order it with your PC, they can send you the disks once free of charge: Dell - Support

That is your best bet versus torrents that might have viruses or such or might get your ISP angry at you...

Note that Dell will only give you the disk for the OS you ordered. If you ordered 7 Pro, you will get 7 Pro. If you only ordered 7 Home, that is what you get.

 

The problem with this is that its going to be full of the bloatware that comes with the recovery disks. I'm wanting to do a clean install to get away from all that stuff. From the research i've done on here it seems the recovery disks that come with the laptop still have all the bloatware on them.

 

Nope. The Dell disks are just the OS on one (an OEM OS with license slip-streamed in, but it only works on a Dell) and the other disk will have drivers and such. They are what I used to reformat mine. DON'T use the Dell datasafe, that will get you the crapware.

The part in Red means you get the OS, drivers, and utilities, you can install any or none of the utilities no problem. It is just a collection disc, very easy to use.

 

Thank you very much, rep added
Hmm yes I did use the datasafe so thats where i've gone wrong.
In the meantime i've now downloaded this http://forum.notebookreview.com/win...-7-download-links-just-like-vista-before.html from this forum and will follow Scotts step by step guide. I don't want to wait for the disks to come from Dell so i'm hoping this will be a good alternative.
I have 82 processes running at the moment, lets see how it performs with a clean install!

 

Well fresh with just drivers you will be in like the 50-60 range IIRC. 80 is fine for a functioning system these days under 7, honestly with all the RAM in computers now it is less critical but it's just the fact of the matter with me that I had 90-some processes on a "new" computer.

As far as the links, well good luck there. I know when I had Dell send me the disks for my sister's computer last year (recovery partition was broke so I COULDN'T do the Dell DataSafe, lol, that confused Dell...) I had them the next day. They typically ship pretty quickly. But yea, if you want to do it today/tomorrow, that link looks like your best bet. Good Luck!

 

Hi Scott,

Thanks for this great response, I sure will use it wen I have the time to reinstall Win7 on my Dell XPS 17 (L702X). Just 2 questions :
1. how do I know which BIOS version I have (and what if I have another than mentioned in your mail) ?
2. how do you know your way to through all the drivers Dell shows when you trying to download drivers ?

Regards,
Arthur

 

^ BIOS version doesn't matter, neither does order. Just go here. You should know which ones to download after seeing what the drivers apply to. If you have Feature X on your laptop, you need the driver

 

Do not just go there as that page is for the L502x, not the L702x being addressed here.

Scott

 

1. The BIOS version is typically shown below the Dell logo when you first turn the system ON. You can also hit F2 during this splash screen cycle to enter the BIOS setup which will also list the version number. The current BIOS version is A11. Keeping the BIOS updated is recommended, but not required if your system is functioning correctly.

2. I usually rename the .exe being downloaded to something easier to reference. For example, if the chipset file is named R289307.exe, just choose to save the download and rename it to something like "chipset_01" and so on...

Just take it slow and know what you are installing before you do it. Most of all, enjoy the learning process!

Here is the L702X driver download page: Drivers & Downloads

Scott-

 

Hey guys, i ran in to some problems instaling drivers into my xps (i5core)(8gb Ram)(nvidia 555/ 3GB) the problem is i installed win7 64bit. And then installed drivers evrything went smooth, but later i had to reinstall windows, and now, when i try to install nvidia drive i get this mesige from instal that i need "You must install intel drivers first". Thing is that i have done as Scott previously told and it still pops up that i need to instal intel drives, maybe some could help me ?

 

You do have to install the Intel graphics driver first. Have you done that yet? NVidia relies on the Optimus, so it needs Intel in place first. That's really the only catch in the reinstall.

 

G. If you do not have the 3D system, install the Intel HD video first Intel Video ...then the Nvidia driver Nvidia 550/555
If you have the 3D compatible system, install ONLY the Nvidia driver (first), then install the Nvidia 3D emitter driver 3D emitter
But earlier i installed only the 555 software, and evrything went fine, only now it goes wrong, how can i check have i 3D system ?

 

Well do you have the 3D screen? If not, you don't have the 3D system. You will see an emitter at the bottom of the screen bezel too if it is 3D. But yes, if you have 3D system, ignore the Intel graphics. Just because you have a 3D-capable card does not make it a 3D system. It's all about the screen, the Intel graphics are bypassed on the mobo on the 3D hence the driver is useless there.

You likely installed the Intel graphics first then if the 555 graphics installed, whether you realized it or not. There are a lot of drivers. Or you got lucky, it's not supposed to really work but sometimes Windows can do that.

 

Big thanks, for answering my question

 

Have another question, i installed Windows 7 Ultimate, and it shows that from 8GB ram usable are 6.92. Why is that ?

 

This MS KB article addresses that question:

The usable memory may be less than the installed memory on Windows 7-based computers

 

Performed the clean install step by step and no problems.

I do have a question... I purchased my device from the Dell Outlet and for some stupid reason it doesn't let me use that Dell Factory installed software download site. Says my service tag isn't supported. Well... my PC came with pre-installed software that I can't get to now.

That being said... its nothing "critical" but I would like to have that Dell Webcam software. The kids liked putting themselves in those cooky backgrounds, etc. I can't find the software anywhere. Does anyone know where else I may be able to find it?