installing windows drivers from a flash drive

Discussion in 'Software' started by texasharper, Oct 29, 2010.

  1. texasharper

    texasharper Corporal

    I have reinstalled the OS (windows xp home)on my sons Dell Inspirion 8200 laptop, however the drivers and utilities disk is not available. I have downloaded the drivers from Dell online from my other computer onto a flash drive. Dell states that I must download the drivers in order, so I am downloading the drivers one at a time. My question is how do I load them from the flash onto his laptop? When I insert the flash drive I can see the files but have no idea where to go from there.

    Thank you for your invaluable assistance,

    Texasharper
     
  2. Just Playin

    Just Playin MajorGeek

    You can run them from the flash drive.
     
  3. tgell

    tgell Major Geek Extraordinaire

    If they are .exe files, just double click the files in the order that Dell told you to download. Let each driver install before double clicking on the next. Make a list from the page you downloaded from because the order the driver files are displayed in on your flash drive is probably different. And, do this in an admin account.
     
  4. sach2

    sach2 Major Geek Extraordinaire

    I'm not sure exactly how they work but, from memory, I believe dell drivers come in exe files that unpack the drivers to a folder on the HD. So it creates a folder "DELL" on the C: drive and then for each driver it creates another folder inside the Dell folder something like R89453. Sometimes it then installs the driver automatically and sometimes you have to go into each numbered folder such as R89453 and install from there.

    My point being it may be best to not install from the flash drive but copy the files you downloaded to the laptop's desktop and double-click on them from there to be sure the DELL folder is created on the C: drive.
     
  5. texasharper

    texasharper Corporal

    It's too late for me to work on it tonight but will certainly do as instructed tomorrow. Will revisit should I have problems.

    Thanks to all,

    texasharper
     
  6. texasharper

    texasharper Corporal

    Ok, so I finally get down to business and start to load the drivers. I saved them to desktop and today I double click the icon. Which brought up the following box with the title Dell Computor Corporation. Inside this boxsaid, M1004 Error Message Removal Utility vA01 for DOS on Laitude C640 and C840, Inspiron 4150 and 8200.
    With three boxes on the right saying:

    Setup
    Cancel
    About

    When I clicked setup, it brought up a command window C/windows/System 32/cmd.exe.
    Inside this it says

    Dell Computer Self-Extracting Diskette Set
    Please insert a formatted disketteand press Enter or press CTRL-C to exit.

    Where do I go from here?
     
  7. sach2

    sach2 Major Geek Extraordinaire

    Well, it looks like that particular exe wants to create a set of floppy diskettes to achieve some purpose that runs outside of Windows.
    So even if you see a #M1004 error before Windows starts it is not a necessary driver and can be skipped for now.

    There is no NES utility for your system so you can skip number 1 in the picture below and begin installing the drivers with the Chipset drivers (R34506.exe).
     
    Last edited: Jan 17, 2012

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