Reinstalling windows

digiman

There is a problem with my laptop. Its giving me error code c0000415 unknown hard error, I looked on the net and its something to do with my graphics card. Its a 128MB Ati Radeon Mobility 9600 PRO TURBO. Ive rang dell and after an hour on the phone doing the same thing repeately she told me to ring a software support line for reinstalling windows.
I am running it on safe mode an putting all my important files on my desktop. The thing is I would like to keep all my updates for windows and my subscription to Norton Anti Virus. I was wondering would it be just a case of copying these files onto the desktop and then transferring them back when I reinstall windows. Would this work?
If anyone knows anything about the error could they give me some help, its just that I have alot of stuff on it that and I dont want the bother of having to reinstall everything again. I wont be reinstalling until the morning, if it comes to that, so someone please help me.

Dun

The first thing you should do is go to the ATI site and get a new driver for your graphics card. ANYTHING YOU LEAVE ON YOUR COMPUTER WILL BE DELETED if you use Dell's system restore to reinstall windows. ATI's driver web page is here:
http://www.ati.com/support/driver.html

the_syco

digiman wrote:

I am running it on safe mode an putting all my important files on my desktop. The thing is I would like to keep all my updates for windows and my subscription to Norton Anti Virus. I was wondering would it be just a case of copying these files onto the desktop and then transferring them back when I reinstall windows. Would this work?

If you do a fresh reinstall, Program Files, My Documents, Desktop, and a few others will most likely be wiped.

Dell won't care what you will lose, if you reinstall windows.

=====

So just do what Dun says, and goto the graphics site, and download the graphics driver.

digiman

Probably didnt explain that to well. When I was saying desktop I meant the other computer I have in the house. If I transferred all my files onto it, Program Files etc, and then just put them back on the laptop after windows has been reinstalled via a crossover cable. Would everything still work the same?

Dun

Your programs won't - they'll have to be reinstalled. Have you tried installing the new driver? It's a lot less hassle than reinstalling windows!

KdjaCL

Reinstalled windows today in 4 hours ( a new record for me)

Step 1 pen and paper write down al the programs you want to keep get the setup.exes for them.
2 Copy My Documents to a safe place
3 Export Firefox and thunderbird settings or outlook internet explorer
4 For updates you should really use the catalogue option on the windows update site that way you download them as exe files ,they install but a copy is alos left on your pc for next time.
5 Norton has an option for reinstalling subbies check the help file.

Then format and start again.

But really you should get the ATI driver from ATI , Dells drivers suck.

kdjac

Zonko

4 hours! What all did you have to do to it? Thats really feckin' ages! In my experiance its a 20 minute job. But Gentoo linux on the other hand, takes about 8-10 hours just to do the very basic OS installation itself

KdjaCL

Zonko wrote:

4 hours! What all did you have to do to it? Thats really feckin' ages! In my experiance its a 20 minute job. But Gentoo linux on the other hand, takes about 8-10 hours just to do the very basic OS installation itself

Umm reinstall 18Gb of games and programs.
Windows flew in its the stupid dicking about getting all my games and stupid little mp3 converters etc: back on.

kdjac

Zonko

If I ever meet Bill Gates....
*Puts on his bitch-slapping glove* Or.....
*Takes out his throat stabbing blades*

digiman

I will try and download the drivers today, Its just that im on dial up and there is over 20MB to download. Oh I wish I was back on the college network where I used to get up to 5MB/s or 6MB/s depending on where I was downloading from. Thanks for the help if it comes to reinstalling.

ShiverinEskimo

Blank cd, net cafe/friend with broadband, 3 minutes.

digiman

ShiverinEskimo wrote:

Blank cd, net cafe/friend with broadband, 3 minutes.

Its sounds simple, but I would probably have it downloaded by the time I would get to a netcafe, there is nobody I know within a half hour drive of me that has broadband, its not that im living in a remote area, a few mins from killybegs but eircom havn't managed to get broadband here yet. Thanks for the suggestion though.

digiman

THANKS for da help lads. That download seems to have done the trick. Glad not to have reinstalled everything. If only dell could have told me what was wrong, its just shows how poor there support is.

unkel

KdjaC wrote:

Reinstalled windows today in 4 hours ( a new record for me)

:eek: Takes me 15 mintues, no matter how much software/programs I have installed over time

Here's the process:

1. Boot the Pc with the bootable image DVD in place. When prompted to boot from CD hit any key on the keyboard to confirm
2. Go for a pee / fag / coffee, etc and come back 15 minutes later

All is well again :cool:

Zonko

unkel wrote:

:eek: Takes me 15 mintues, no matter how much software/programs I have installed over time

Here's the process:

1. Boot the Pc with the bootable image DVD in place. When prompted to boot from CD hit any key on the keyboard to confirm
2. Go for a pee / fag / coffee, etc and come back 15 minutes later

All is well again :cool:

I think he meant including installing another 18gb of software and games too. That would be annoying.

RicardoSmith

Best place for Dell specific help is the Dell Talk forums. Just for future reference.

KdjaCL

unkel wrote:

:eek: Takes me 15 mintues, no matter how much software/programs I have installed over time

Here's the process:

1. Boot the Pc with the bootable image DVD in place. When prompted to boot from CD hit any key on the keyboard to confirm
2. Go for a pee / fag / coffee, etc and come back 15 minutes later

All is well again :cool:

So why reinstall in the 1st place?
Every 6 months fresh clean fornatand reinstall keeps pc nice and happy. And gets rid of an ver expanding program list.

kdjac