Owner's Thread: Dell Inspiron 7000 series

I just received my laptop and it has Windows 8 instead of Windows 8.1. The "Store" does not show the upgrade. I ran wsreset and that did not help. Anyone else having this issue? I had to remove McAfee because Windows updates failed (all 59 of them).

 

Were you able to do the updates after removing Mcafee? The reason they failed prob because the lap was installing something else. Give it a moment then do a restart to try all the updates again. After that win 8.1 should be avai in the Store.

 

I don't use McAfee so it was the first thing I removed, and Norton 360 Premier is what I turned around and installed as I prefer Norton products.

I also did not see the 8.1 upgrade in the store until I went through the update process for 8.0. Run Windows Update on you Win 8 system, and once the updates are finished then when you reboot and go back into the store the 8.1 upgrade will be offered.


Enjoy...

 

I was able to install all of the updates once I removed McAfee. Rebooted, checked for updates, one more was available, installed it, rebooted. Still no Win 8.1 in the store.

 

After uninstall of McAfee and all updates installed, and several reboots - still no Win 8.1 in the store. I changed power savings to not sleep and left it on overnight and still no Win 8.1 in the store.

 

You need to install ALL Windows updates before it appears in the store., typically that means you install a bunch of updates (40 or so) the first time, then there will be 1-2 updates, after you install those you should see 8.1 in the store.

 

There were 59 updates originally, applied them, rebooted, checked for updates again, found one, installed, rebooted, checked for updates again, there were no more.

Went to the store and no Win 8.1.

I haven't seen this issue with any of my other PCs. I believe it is a Dell image issue....dreading the thought of having to try a clean install without media

 

I haven't seen anyone mention this...how are the speakers? Are they clear and loud enough? This is something that gets overlooked in reviews so I just wanted some user feedback..I am about to order this laptop this afternoon...Thanks in advance!:hi2:

 

speakers work great for the laptop, i mean its no B&W home speaker, but they are as nice as my old HP with sub at the sub.

 

Hi BHHOWARD, I'm having the exact same issue with Windows 8.1 not showing up in the store, I tried the same as you did, but no luck. I wonder where this can come from...apparently there are some posts on the web on this issue but none of the suggested workarounds worked for me. Anybody else having the issue or any ideas?

 

Hi all, I have been reading this thread extensively and just signed up to ask a few questions if anyone could help out it would be great as I have this laptop being delivered this week.

1. Will this laptop take a 7200rpm Hybrid Drive 1tb and how has everyone found cloning the old drive?

2. The display, is brightness alright/good?

3. Wifi, is this issue still present on the later shipments?

 

The speakers are in comparison to a sony svs15 much better, and in comparison to my old Dell Vostro and a low budget Inspiron better. Im really pleased with it.

 

It should be table to take any 2.5" hard drive and as for cloning I used Macrium Reflect Free Edition.

The brightness in my opinion is very good and I didn't encounter any wifi problems. If you do then you can try installing the latest driver and hopefully it will be solved.

There is one issue that some owners encountered which was when the laptop went to sleep/hibernate or the display turned off after not being used for some time, it does not come back on. If resuming from sleep/hibernate, the laptop will start up with the exception of the screen. This was solved by uninstalling the latest intel display driver and installing the previous version which is 10.18.10.3304.

 

I have a windows 8 disc from another computer. I'm going to create a bootable USB thumb drive from it, and then reinstall windows 8. I should then be able to upgrade. I'll let everyone know my progress.

Note: If you do this, be sure to use a program to get the windows key before you wipe the drive. I'm going to use Belarc Advisor to retrieve the key.

 

stop! before you start reinstalling everything from scratch, try this technique that SOLVED my issue! I found this on the dell forum. Prius2004 is my hero! Big thanks to him!

Posted by Prius2004
on 11 Dec 2013 10:29 PM


Performing the following steps (which I grabbed from another thread) was what revealed the 8.1 upgrade in the Store in my case. I tried everything else but nothing worked.

1) Uninstall KB2871389 and reboot.

2) Download the KB2871389 update from Microsoft --> Download Update for Windows 8 for x64-based Systems (KB2871389) from Official Microsoft Download Center

3) Install the KB2871389 update manually and reboot.

4) The 8.1 upgrade should be visible in the Windows Store.

Let me know if this solved your issue!

 

guys,I come from HK.

PC Model: Dell Inspiron 7537 FHD
SSD: Intel 530 240G (old WD HDD 1TB)
OS: Windows 8.1 x64
BIOS: A06
CPU: i7 4500U
RAM: 8GB
Clone by EaseUS Todo Backup Free.

Share my record

 

old WD HDD 1TB = original HDD came with your laptop ?

 

Has anyone figured out a way to create restore disks that will work on a new, smaller hard drive? When I created a flash drive through the backup tool it will not restore to my 250GB SSD and insists it needs a 926GB drive.

 

Has anyone tried make a hackintosh with this laptop ?

Thanks ¡¡

 

i would like to know too...

 

I saw a review from laptop mag that said sound was really good, and a few others hear said the same. I must have a set of bad speakers, because my audio sounds like it's coming from a tin can. My son is in a competitive drumline, and when I play a video of them performing, I can hear the marimbas fine, but can barely hear the drums. With headphones, the sound is great, so I'm going to ask dell to replace speakers along with wifi card.

 

I don't see what the problem would be, the parts are all found in current Macs so there should be no problems - intel hd4000, nvidia 750M, intel wireless/bluetooth, realtek ethernet - obviously the touch screen won't work.

It's a laptop, the sound is good for a laptop - also since the speakers face downwards the surface will have an effect on what the sound will sound be (in fact it sounds best when you hold it up in the air )

 

Mine doesn't tho - I tried that because of the speaker placement, and it still sounds atrocious.

 

So I'm a little irritated. I created a backup disc and it will not work to restore to my SSD. It insists that I need a 926GB drive to restore. So I have it running because I used the migration tool but now I'm out of luck if I need to restore my system.

 

Update since I last posted.

After testing the Dell 1901 for a couple of hrs I decided to install Windows 8 from scratch.. Before that I updated the firmware of my SSD and performed a clean install on Windows 8.

It's been rock solid with no disconnections, no slow downs and the wireless card connects to the wireless network immediately unlike Windows 8.1 where it takes some time to connect to the wireless router. I don't think I will be installing Windows 8.1 anytime soon..

Very impressed by the new Dell 1901.

Btw the best way to test the wireless disconnections and performance is to remote desktop to another PC and work remotely on that PC because when the connection drops or slows down it effects the remote desktop session immediately.

 

Did any user who cloned the HDD with an SSD manage to use/test the recovery partition? Is it possible to have it working? I suppose it'll depend on the cloning software used I would think. For instance it seems that Samsung Data Migration is not able to deal with recovery partitions. Apparently Acronis True Image should do it. Any inputs?

 

I think the best way to do that is to shrink your OS partition via Windows disk manager to match the size of the SSD and then create a rescue disk.. If the OS partition is greater than the target disk size it will fail to restore..

 

The recovery partition itself works fine. But even the USB backup I created from the SSD does not work.

 

Maybe this will help.

v5: How to clone a disk (Clone Disk, v5)

 

Well if I went that route I'd need a 40+ GB external to devote to it. While the recovery drive is only 11GB.

 

Thanks for the reply. This worked!!!! I had tried to install the KB before, but it was already installed. Uninstalling it, rebooting, installing, rebooting, then running wsreset allowed me to finally see the upgrade.

thanks again!

 

7537 Just put down ONE 2.5HDD, Unfortunately no mSATA

 

Only one issue to report so far. After cloning the HDD to the SSD, I started getting the PC going to the screen saying I needed to activate Windows. It was activated on the HDD before I cloned it. And the activation error was that the unlock limit was already reached for this product key.

So finally got around to calling Dell tonight, since there is no Windows 8 key in the Dell box. Dell tech support told me the Win 8 key is "injected into the motherboard" and that I needed to call Microsoft to resolve. They gave me the number, and said a Dell technician would call back tomorrow to ensure I had gotten it resolved. I called Microsoft, and a tech support engineer walked me through the resolution. Seems all set now as Windows shows activated.

No other issues to report so far.

Regards

 

Thanks for the info; I'm actually planning to use Acronis to clone mine, but I don't like this Windows key story. Woud you mind giving some details about how the resolution that the Microsoft engineer gave you?
By the way is your recovery partition working Ok, can you use it?

THanks!

 

Yes it seems so.. After I installed Windows 8 it activated itself when I went online...

 

I have realized of a little problem in my installation. I did a clean install of an own copy of Windows 8. First af all I tried Dell backup tool, but when I tried to restore it in my SSD, it told me that my backup was corrupt, thats the reason I did a clean install.

Ok, now if I want to activate UEFI boot in BIOS, I receive the message "no boot device found". If I turn back to Legacy Boot, it works fine. Is there any way to fix it without breaking my actual windows installation? What benefits would give me that UEFI boot? My laptop starts in about 5-6 seconds, I don't know if it will improve anything...

 

You need to contact Microsoft by phone. They will have you run a program to activate by phone which will show you your Installation ID (a very long number), and after a bit will generate a Confirmation ID (another very long number) that they will give you back to put in. Once you do that, Windows will be activated. Was on the phone perhaps 10 min.

Regards

PS Have not tested the recovery partition yet. (I have kept the HDD as a backup if needed.)

 

Interesting that Acronis seems to have an issue pulling the activation across while no one that's used the Samsung migration tool has had an issue.

Also, for the future, there is a way to deactivate Windows. So you could clone the system, deactivate Windows on the HDD and then the activation should proceed without an issue on the SSD. Unfortunately I'm having trouble finding the link again but when I do I'll repost it.

 

does anyone try to install hackintosh on this machine?

 

Is there a golden user in this forum who managed the following:

1) clone the HDD to an SSD
2) keep the recovery partition and have it working properly (confirmed with a boot test from it)
3) all this without windows re-activation need.
4) have all this nice pckage running flawlessly for several weeks.

If you managed to do it, please le me know what cloning software you used! Cheers!

From what I read in this forum I captured the folowing:
Samsung Data Migration managed: 1+3+4
Acronis: 1+2+4
EaseUS: 1+3+4

 

With the Samsung Data Migration tool, the recovery partition works, just like with Acronis. The issue is the recovery disk/flash drive that you can create as a backup.

Edit: I take that back. The recovery partition is missing. There's an extra partition (a 490MB "Recovery Partition") but Dell backup and recovery does not work.

 

Does anyone know if it's possible to remap 2 finger click to middle mouse button? The synaptics suite only gives me the option to map it to right click which is useless since I can just as easily actually do a right click.

 

I'm thinking about buying this laptop for my wife. Top configuration version (i7, 16GB DDR3L, 256GB SSD, GT750M, FullHD...) is 989€ (TAX Included) in Dell Spain with some discounts. I think is a very good deal.

The only question we have is about the keyboard. How good is it? Does It have too much flex?

Thank you!

 

Hola,

i´m from spain too waiting for same laptop. I think is a good deal too.
I´ve read good comments about keyboard

Salu2

 

Does you guys notice the CPU Turbo Boost Limitation ? I've run cinebench (100% CPU) and the CPU goes turbo for about 5 seconds, and then it get backto normal 1.8 GHz(90%), get it on linux too (kernel comp).
Also notice that CPU could go turbo for longer, but only when the cpu charge is not that high (30-40%)
see also here Review Dell Inspiron 15-7537 Notebook - NotebookCheck.net Reviews Processor part

 

Hello checho. What discounts have you used? I am from Spain too.
Keyboard is good to me.

About my ghosting problem, a technician came to repair the laptop with a new screen. After replace it, the new screen had ghosting too (and a dead pixel!) so I asked him to replace it with the old one. After some hours the screen stops working.

Now, after speak with technical support, they told me that they are not going to repair my laptop anymore, because the ghosting problem is a general problem they have, so if they repair my black screen, the ghosting problem is not going to be fixed.

They gave to me two options: get my money back, or replace it with other model. I really like this laptop, and ghosting bothers me, but is not a critical problem for me, and bothers me that they don't want to look what the problem is (I am sure it is only a loose cable!).

Maybe I will take my money back and then I will buy the SSD version with the discounts.

 

I have a question to the owners: How are your buttons of the touchpad? Are both buttons working equally or is there a difference between them?

I ask, because my left and right buttons are giving a different response and voice.

 

Hola, tambien español,

your new screen stops working and dell refused to fixing because ghosting ?

I think Dell and customer care are not what they used to be anymore

 

Hi!

I am not an expert in this area, but downloaded CineBench and ran it. I have a 7537 with Windows 8.1, 8GB memory and a 1TB SSD. I am not seeing the behavior you describe. In fact, since my SSD install (swapped it for the 5400RPM HDD), as reported by Win 8.1/Task Manager/Performance my laptop CPU seems to live in Turbo boost mode. In periods of low CPU utilization (3%-15%) it consistently reports a CPU speed in the range of 2.8-2.9GHz, pretty much whenever I look.

I ran CineBench CPU and for the first 30-40% of the CPU run (by clock time, although I did not actually time it -- just my sense) it reports 100% utilization and speed in the range of 2.75-2.95GHz. . Then it dropped back to the range of 2.35-2.5GHz for the remainder (all with 100% utilization). It never dropped below 2.29 at least that was reported on the screen.

I know that I saw Trrbo Boost mode on the CPU quite a lot before I swapped the HDD for a SSD, but the HDD was the bottleneck. But I did not see TurbBoost this much when the HDD was installed. I wonder if the HDD was a bottleneck that cause the CPU to have to wait and it dropped out of Turbo mode? And now it does not have to wait on the disk.

Regards...

 

Anyone please?