Project of the day: Install Windows 8 Retail Pro on Inspiron 17R SE (7720)

Hi,

This morning i woke up with a silly idea... which would be to install Windows 8 on my Dell Inspiron 17R SE (7720).

So i grabbed it from my Technet/MSDN account so i can get a valid serial number and downloaded the .ISO. (I will change my serial number on Oct. 26th as i already pre-ordered Win8 for this laptop from Microsoft for 15$, it was qualified for it... ).

So i started windows 7 as usual and inserted the DVD in the laptop to get prompted to... windows update... which i already had completed, so this step only took 30sec..

After this, i was prompted with the serial number request, which i provided and then Windows 8 installer proceeded with system inspection, only to report that:

• Dell Touchpad was incompatible with windows 8 and needed to be uninstalled
• Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host was incompatible and had to be uninstalled.
• I had only 15gb left, and the upgrade requires 20gb
• Microsoft Security Essentials is incompatible with windows 8 (there is a new version of this in Windows 8, so it had to go away)
• Have to reboot to reflect the changes

So i proceeded with this, and i am currently upgrading my windows 7 installation to windows 8. Not the best thing to do i know... but i just want to know if everything works with the upgrade process.

Now, once this is completed, i will report if everything still works... hoping the USB 3.0 will work natively in Windows 8.

I will come back later...

 

Do now worry... i can revert back to windows 7 using my True Image backup... so if i need to come back to where i was, i will... i also had refreshed all my benchmarks on windows 7 yesterday following the official nvidia 306.97 drivers.

So i will compare the result of my benchmarks once all bits and bytes are resolved following my Win7 to Win8 upgrade. I know that Windows 8 isn't the best approach to users with it's MetroUI, but i tried Start8 by Stardock, and it's restoring what i liked about the start menu... so i will be testing the overall performance of Windows 8 with what i had with Windows 7.

Stay tuned!

 

Installation complete...

Only problem so far is with the microsoft account i should bind to my PC... it had a problem, what else could be wrong?

Back to my old desktop... so far so good... now it's assessment time for stability testing. Overall, took barely 30min to upgrade.

 

Ok... so far...

• No more Sidebar (desktop gadgets)... need to see if i can restore this in Windows 8... might be a way...

This is fixed, sounds like in Windows 8 RTM there is no more sidebar program installed, there are numerous ways, i found an installer that restored this functionality for me, and all is working as it should now.

• Firefox doesn't seem to work... it keeps telling me that firefox is already running... have to go back using IE10... yeurk!

I was running firefox 14... upgraded to Firefox 15, restarted, and now, i have no errors anymore...

My touchpad is working without any dell software installed... good news... USB also seems to work, will have to perform extensive data transfert to see the overall speed improvment over usb 3.0 in Win8.

No yellow ! in the device manager, so all devices are working properly... no sounds like i have a better drive available for the ethernet card, which i didn't got offered in windows 7... guess it's a windows 8 driver...

 

So far so good... only a couple problem of permissions (NTFS permissions) in my user folder, that was resolved by adding my local account...

Sounds like Windows 8 doesn't grant administrator permissions on an administrator account for certain folders, this can be worked around by adding your local account to the file or folder with Full Control setting... which worked for me. I guess this is a result of upgrading from Windows 7 instead of doing a full windows 8 install from scratch... but i wanted to see if a windows upgrade works, and it works... some problems might not be easy to solve for the average user, as i am an IT professional and a Microsoft certified partner...

What so ever... it works! And i only tampered like 30 min to solve the minor problems, everything is like when i left windows 7, except, that i am now running Windows 8 Pro...

 

The Windows Experience Index in Windows 8 goes up to 9.9... just discovered this... so no more max at 7.9 anymore.

This is what i had in Windows 7 with 306.97 drivers:

Windows Experience Index = 7.2
Processor = 7.6
Memory (RAM) = 7.7
Graphics = 7.2
Gaming Graphics = 7.2
Primary Hard Disk = 7.8

This is what i have now with Windows 8 Pro with the same 306.97 drivers:

Windows Experience Index = 7.2
Processor = 7.9
Memory (RAM) = 7.8
Graphics = 7.2
Gaming Graphics = 7.2
Primary Hard Disk = 7.9

But running my games, i am getting the same performance as i was in Windows 7... so i will keep using windows 8, so far i have no reasons to go back to Win 7...

 

Ok... after more extensive testing, i was forced to un-install and re-install Steam. For some reasons, some of the games were not detecting steam anymore. So after a full re-install of steam, the games, and patching session, all is working well.

So far i am getting a couple FPS more in every games... will install my Futuremark benchmarks tonight and will proceed with this later on.

 

is there any improvement in battery life?

 

Cool writeup, thanks for sharing!

Just out of interest, does the Fn+F3 turn off the touchpad even with the default Windows drivers? That's the only reason I have the Dell drivers installed, it wouldn't work on my 7720 (Win7 64bit) otherwise.

 

With the Windows 8 native driver, no it doesn't...

But i re-installed the driver on Dell website, and everything works... FN+F3 disables the touchpad as it was in Windows 7 but inside Windows 8... so go figure why the compatibility test says this driver wasn't compatible... it works flawlessly.

Hope this helps.

 

Didn't test out the battery yet, plugged in all day. Once i nail all the bits and bytes, i will take a backup and start doing benchmarks with Futuremark then test battery life. Stay tuned.

 

Excellent write up, will be very useful when all of us upgrade. Did you replace all native Windows 8 drivers with Dell ones? Is the graphics driver from Nvidia or Dell? Also, how does this imaging software work. Is it a paid version? I remember in Vista Business there used to be a native backup feature available in Windows. I wonder is we can use this to backup the existing Dell config of Windows 7?

 

I am using Acronis True Image Home 2013, this is the only version working with Windows 8. It's a paid version.

I did an inline upgrade, so i inserted the Windows 8 DVD and followed instructions from there, so all drivers i had were the ones from Windows 7. Now, i re-installed both video drivers in windows 8 (Intel HD 4000 and nVidia, with the latest Windows 8 ones). I also re-installed the DELL touchpad driver (the windows compatibility test asked me to remove it prior to upgrade) once windows 8 was installed. The nVidia driver is from nVidia, latest one which is WHQL for Windows 8... not from DELL. Dell hasn't upgraded anything on their support page since last June, and i REALLY doubt they will do anything with Windows 8 release... beside probably BIOS upgrades..

The only new software i am using on Windows 8 (since i upgraded my Windows 7, i got same exact software installed):

• I removed Windows Security Essentials (using the included version with Windows 8)
• Installed Stardock Start8 (Registered version) so i can get the Start Menu button... awsome piece of software for Windows8 MetroUI hater... and cost 5$

 

As you might have seen, i edited my Windows Experience Index from the earlier post... for an unknown reason, when i re-installed the Win8 drivers for the nVidia card and the Win8 driver for the Intel HD 4000, the WEI index started to use the nVidia card... just like in windows 7... go figure, i did nothing and it worked... So make sure you upgrade your drivers (306.97 are official nVidia drivers that support Windows 8 that are WHQL).

As for the Intel HD 4000, when i ran Windows Update, there was an optional driver available that was newer than the one i had, so i installed this one (Version 9.17.10.2849)

Here are some benchmarks:

3DMark11

With Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP1 (Using nVidia 306.97):

3DMark11 = 2338
Grapnics Score = 2116
Physics Score = 7783
Combined Score = 1869

With Windows 8 Pro x64 (Using nVidia 306.97):

3DMark11 = 2333
Grapnics Score = 2116
Physics Score = 7232
Combined Score = 1872

So the only noticeable difference, is regarding the Physics score... i recall that i used the same exact version of nVidia drivers, which also uses the same version of Physics score. The rest of the benchmark is exactly the same, i wonder why i got a 7.6% drop in this score... early stage drivers probably ( i ran the benchmark like 10 times, and everytime i changed in nVidia control panel the Physics to auto, GT650 and CPU) and always got the same score... so left it to recommanded which is auto-select.

PCMark07

With Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP1 (Using nVidia 306.97):

PCMark07 = 4337

With Windows 8 Pro x64 (Using nVidia 306.97):

PCMark07 = 4519

Now, this is something good... a nice improvement... not large, but something.

3DMark Vantage

With Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP1 (Using nVidia 306.97):

3DMark Vantage = 10301
Grapnics Score = 8757
CPU Score = 21294

With Windows 8 Pro x64 (Using nVidia 306.97):

3DMark Vantage = 10306
Grapnics Score = 8757
CPU Score = 21819

Now, again, mostly the same score... except for the CPU Score, which is like 4-5% higher. This would go with the PCMark07 score, that mostly also score the CPU, which means, that the CPU management of multicore/multithreaded applications are better managed in Windows 8.

The overall score shows mostly the same result, which is something i am not surprised, it's exactly the same laptop... where i see differences, it's under the drivers... we are really in an early stage of the Windows 8 drivers... i guess the best assumption is that the nVidia drivers (306.97) performs better under windows 7 than under windows 8. The Physics score is lower in Windows 8, and i can't seem to see a real difference under my usual games... i am getting mostly the same FPS as i had with Windows 7... + or - 1-2 FPS ... now when a game like TF2 runs over 120fps... 1 or 2 FPS drop or raise won't do a thing... but for a game like BF3, which runs for me at around 42-47 FPS on auto... a 1-2 FPS drop is nothing good... a raise would be nice, and i imagine we will probably see this in the future driver releases... and with other drivers that would come out nativly for windows 8, the laptop can only get better... (BTW... in Windows 8, running BF3 on Low graphics at 1920x1080 gives me 65fps, on Medium around 52-53, and on high, 30-32fps)

I can say that right now, i will be staying under Windows 8, especially when i found Stardock Start8 that fills the gap where i hated Windows 8... this is a no brainer for me... the upgrade from Microsoft at 15$ (which everyone that bought a 7720 should be entitled to) is a no brainer, you should get it... will only add to the value of your laptop of you decide to sell it in 1-2 years with the latest version of Windows... and legit over the top!.

That's it... now, testing battery time!

 

Ok... for people asking about battery life... i didn't see any improvement, nor getting worst... i am getting on browsing around 1:30min of battery time, like i did under Windows 7.

For gaming, as usual, you can't really game on battery, even with your power profile set as your plugged in state, as the on battery is just too erratic for steady FPS. But gaming got me like 20-30min game time... which is not what i expected more... This laptop is not designed for gaming on battery power...

 

Why u getting only 1:30 min on browsing battery lyf .?

I usually get around 2:30 - 3:00 hrs of Wi-Fi browsing on battery . Lowest brightness ....

 

1st - Because i have 5% wear on my battery.
2nd - Because my power profile on battery was modified to reflect the same config as my plugged-in profile.
3rd - Because i let the screen full brightness.
4th - Because my Wifi card isn't the stock one, but a Bigfoot Killer Network Card (1102 Wireless-N connected on a 5ghz band)
5th - I have 2 Vertex 3 120gb SSD internal + 1TB Samsung HDD internal (in place of the ODD) and i also use a 500gb external usb 3.0 HDD, and a 32gb mSata SSD. All those uses more power than only one HDD without mSata.
6th - And lastly, because i upgraded to Windows 8, and i am sure i don't have power optimized drivers since Win8 is not officially out yet.

I think all of those tax the battery enough for it to last only 1h to 1h30min... which i don't care because i never use the laptop on battery, it's mostly all the time plugged in which is why i have 5% wear in like 4 months.

And over the top, i have a hard time beliving that you last 2h30 to 3h00 of battery on a 7720 with WiFi on... I was getting this 3-4h of battery time with my Alienware m11x which was designed from the ground up for battery saving, and it had a battery with double the capacity of the battery we have in the 7720...

 

I have a lot of tweaks for turning everything off on battery ..

BTW can you tell how to reduce the battery wear .? How can we maintain the battery life .?

 

Best way to avoid battery wear, is not to let the charger in once the battery is fully charged.

 

But how do we do that if we play a lot of games , since games run fine only on AC .?

 

Well, you got your own answer... this means start saving to replace your batteries then, because when they will be used up you'll have to replace them... no real way to achieve this.

 

Take out your battery and only plug your power cable in

 

So should we play games by taking out battery and playing only on AC power .?

 

Well there is also an option that prevents battery charging while active

 

What option, where. Please explain

 

Right-click on the battery icon in the windows notification area, there is an option there for "desktop" charging mode or something similar, basically it should charge the battery less often, it also seems to charge it much slower than usual. This should in theory make it last longer.

I've never seen this option on other laptops I've had in the past, it seems like something added by the Dell drivers. A nice option to have, IMO, as I only use the laptop with the adapter. I definitely wouldn't remove the battery, it's nice to have it there ready to go (a built in UPS in a way) in case of a power failure.

 

Right-click on the battery icon ( bottom right corner), go to energy options and then go to the battery charging in desktop mode

 

Hi all

It seems Dell suddenly released a huge lot of new drivers for Windows 8 with date 22nd Oct. Has anyone tried these, and are they worth upgrading to?

 

win 8 is junk...............its great for Tablets & touch screen..thats it.

 

All the drivers have been updated, including the Windows 7 ones with date 22 Oct. [Mostly the drivers would be common I guess]

 

I did a clean install but I have found that there is a problem with not having the •Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host installed.
I use a security dongle for certain programmes and they do not work.
I do know the Dongles work on W8 because my Desktop pc has windows 8 and they work fine on there.
Windows updates installs the drivers fine but I need a fix for the •Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host

 

weird. windows 8 installed generic usb 3.0 drivers for me

 

For anyone who successfully installed Win 8 clean on this machine, did you download and apply the Dell Windows 8 drivers, *or* did you continue with the drivers installed by Windows Update?

Also, how do you get the "Accelerate" tab in Intel Rapid Storage? I was unable to configure that in Windows 8. My setup is:

* Primary bay - SSD
* 2nd bay - orig Dell 1TB (I swapped it here from Primary bay)
* msata

I had installed all the dell Windows 8 drivers and everything was fine, till yesterday when suddenly all my desktop icons disappeared, Windows explorer was unable to find my drives and constantly hanging, and all settings like WiFi passwords kept resetting at every boot. I ran Windows repair and it could not fix the problem. I had to do Refresh and sacrifice all my apps except the metro apps. After refresh, I found that my Desktop files were still there, but they were not showing up prior to refresh! I have never seen this happen in any machine before. Chkdsk did not find any drive errors in any drives either.

I would be very grateful if anyone could help me with these issues.

 

seems you have a lot of struggle with windows 8 ??

if i was you i would wait for the new server pack for win8....then install it !

 

If anyone else has faced these problems please help.. Yesterday, I installed some drivers from Intel instead of Dell and I am currently testing that out. I am actually surprised this machine is facing Windows 8 problems because the current 17R SE is being sold with Windows 8 out of the box.

 

I just upgraded a DELL Inspiron 15R 5520 8G, 1T from Windows7 to Windows8. Zero issues. I downloaded all the drivers for Win8 from the DELL website. Laptop runs fine. I added a Start8 button so that I now have the speed of Win8 without the need to use that miserable START menu that sucks. Laptop boots in approx 10 secs, and with Win7 it was approx 38 ( I had installed the LENOVO optimization boot program in the Win7 version). Excellent laptop, got it on BF half price....

 

On some dells (not sure about this model), you can turn off battery charging in the bios...maybe check there...i know that option is available on some latitudes...if you could do it in windows as the other poster said that would be more ideal

 

There may be BIOS issues here with users installing SSDs but trying to keep the mSata Cache on the old HDD. On W8 with UEFI this requires you use Intel RST to enable the Cache. However, your SSD would much prefer TRIM enabled which needs AHCI set in the BIOS, not the RST Raid mode. In my opinion, it would be safer to change the BIOS to AHCI (even in W8) so that you get TRIM on the SSD, then forget about caching the HDD (do not use RST), perhaps just use it as a normal (fast) drive, and live with the 5,400rpm speed on the data disk. Clean installs of either W7 or W8 are always best, but if you do an upgrade, at least rerun the WEI so that W8 knows you have an SSD and make the appropriate changes: i.e., will run TRIM rather than defragging the disk.

 

I am soo happy to see that someone else was stupid enough to think of such idea.

I too own 17R 7720 with win7.

And because Me being a fashion queen I had to buy win8 pro (dvd version)

I have installed it over 4 times and re-installed in past 8 months. Always had issue with the generic drivers being downloaded by windows8 before I could get the chance to install Dell's. But the last time it worked like a charm.

Kept using the win8 for some time now. But all of sudden blue screen started to come out of nowhere. and few programs were lacking the stability and compatibility.


So today I finally surrender to the fact that if Dell wanted my laptop to have win 7, who am I to question that.

+win 7 support and stability and reliability is much higher than win8 for now.

I promised my self to come back to win8 one day when the first SP1 comes out.

 

I have W8 on my machine but upgraded the key to W8 Pro while the MS offer was on (31.1.13), so now I have a Dell W8 Reinstallation DVD (& drivers), but a W8 Pro license key. I tried down-loading the W8 Pro 64b DVD from MS, but I don't have a valid key for this (upgrade only). Anyone know where I can get an ISO image of the W8 Pro 64b DVD for a clean install. I would hate to have to go W8, then upgrade again...

 

hi,

what did you do about the Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host because i didn't manage to get it working on windows 8?

 

Try downloading and installing from here:

http://ftp.dell.com/FOLDER01125699M/2/Chipset_Driver_M2RXF_WN_1.0.6.245_A03.EXE