Just not enjoying Vista and going back to XP.

Hi all... mega stuck.... need some help.


Ok...
2 Month old Packard Bell.
Easy Note.
MX37-U-005

I dont want to open the computer to find out what motherboard is in it, but cant get an answer from anyone to confirm it. Dont want to open it, for fear of breaking the warrenty.

This is the specification for the motherboard:

Vista 32bit O/S

SiS Mirage 3+

Supports Intel Core 2 Duo, Intel Pentium D and Intel Pentium 4 processors.

DDR2 support.

PCI Express support.

SiS 968 South Bridge

PCI Express and PCI bus interface.

Integrated LAN controller.

Integrated Serial ATA and IDE controllers.

High Definition Audio support.

Advanced Power Management.

High Speed USB 2.0 peripheral support.

Video

SiS Mirage 3+.

Up to 256 MB shared video memory (dependent on the amount of installed memory).

Audio

RealTek ALC660 High Definition Audio codec. Realtek ALC660 HD Audio
5.1-Channel High Definition Audio Codec
10-10-2006

Network

SiS 191 Ethernet controller.

10/100 Mbit

PCI Express

System Memory

SO-DIMM (Small Outline Dual Inline Memory Module), 2 banks.

Supports up to 4 GB RAM, using 2 GB DDR2 SO-DIMMs.

Supports DDR2 533 and DDR2 667 memory modules.

Supports Dual Channel operation.



Ok, what happend!!!... My girlfriend brought this prior to us meeting, she even paid for it to be setup ready for use, just plug in and go.

It came with Norton 360.
But yes came in contact with a dreaded Virus/Trojan......

All in all She wasn't to impressed with Vista so we put XP on it, all leagle with COA.
Everything went fine but for 3 Drivers. These were the Audio, Graphics and WIFI.

I have after some searching, found the WIFI and the Grapics. The System is up and running everything but the Sound works. Although the WiFi works, but if you turn it of Via the switch by the Keyboard, you have to reboot to activate it again.


I really want to find out the motherboard Details so as I can get the Manafactures System Drivers and all the correct XP drivers.

Packard Bell only list there Vista drivers and the odd XP driver which I have installed.

I have gone through Numoruse Realtek ALC660 listed drivers and managers but they have failed to install, I have noticed that they are listed as 6 Channel.... and in the specs I have, I need a 5.1 Channel.

Any way Thanks for taking the time to read and hope someone can help.

Stephen.

 

Thank you for a WOW... quick response... I will do that has you detailed... its just going to be a day or to as she has taken it to work with her, but will post it up asap..

Thanks again.... Stephen.

 

Hi and hope this is what your asking for.
Thanks again and hope you'll be able to help.

Stephen.

 

Here you go, Windows XP drivers:
Audio http://www.majorgeeks.com/Realtek_High_Definition_Audio_for_2KXP03_d4902.html
UAA Audio (install this before the above driver) http://drivers.softpedia.com/get/SO...AA-Bus-Driver-for-High-Definition-Audio.shtml
Wireless http://www.atheros.cz (select AR5007eg)
Network http://www.sis.com/download/download_step1.php?id=155880
Video http://www.sis.com/download/download_step1.php?id=155942 (this should work, if not, let us know and we'll try again)
I think that covers it.... good luck and let us know how it goes... and welcome to Major Geeks! :major

NOTE: the video driver I linked to doesn't mention your exact model, but I did some research and I believe the above driver will work.

 

Ok... went to install...

Manager came up went through to aprox 90%... then this:

Install Realtek HD Audio Driver Failure ! ! [Error Code : -0001]

OK (tab)

This has been the same for All the Realtek drivers I'v found for ALC660.

Stephen.

 

Download this .zip file, unpack it into your folder of choice.
Go to Control Panel>Device Manager> PCI Device>Update Driver> choose the folder where you extracted it then you have to find the .sys file from the UAA HD Add-on folder and other .sys from Realtek's driver folder and then just boot and it'll automatically activate it.

UAA HD Add-on.zip

 

Ok... In device manager: Sound, Video and game controllers
Audio Codecs....ok
Audio Device on High Definition Audio Bus.....Yellow Caution error
Legacy Audio Driver....ok
Legacy Video Capture Devices....ok
Media Control Devices.....ok
Video Codec....ok


this is the only error on the system...


Just something for info... dont know if this may be apart of problem... so ...:

In add and remove programs.... I have asus ATK0100 ACPI UTILITY...


I did remove and restated the system... not sure where it came from... but onced removed and restarted... it found it on start up and re installed..

Stephen

 

Went t SIS support... this was the result....arrrrgggghhhhh....

North Bridge Chipset: (M)671(2)(FX/DX/MX)
South Bridge Chipset: 968
Graphics Processing Unit: SiS Mirage3 Graphics
USB USB 1.1 / USB 2.0 N/A. Provided by OS.
Audio Not SiS Audio device. Provided by board maker.

The only thing not working at this time is just the sound.

 

It's strange the things you do when you dont seem to be getting anywhere... ok.. I ran an Asus check and it recognized it as a T12S... but again... arrrggg no support for it.

Stephen..

 

I would like to thank all for the help... starting to loose hope though in a solution... and yep I think its all to do with this SIS968... I'm starting to think its going to have to go back to P/B for a reinstall to Factory spec. as they dont even give a install disk with it now... just on the HDD Recovery... but it got wiped in the XP install... Yes I know I could have kept it... but was confident that XP wasnt going to be a prob.....doh.....

Stephen...

 

Wow, Packard Bell is still making computers? I thought they were long gone.

What about just disabling the onboard sound and buying a cheap add on PCI slot sound card? Probably cost you $35 or so. Might even get 6 channel sound, if your gf really wants it, for maybe $50 or so.

Given the onboard sound isn't functioning because you can't find the correct drivers, it may not matter if you turn the onboard sound off or not. But better safe than sorry, so be sure you've turned off the on board sound in the BIOS (even if it's not working) so there's no conflict between the add on card and the on board sound.

 

Must admit, havent given up yet... will try anything and all as I can get it....lol... but she who must be obayed....lol... has taken it to work again...lol.. so its a weekend job again.... mind leaves me time to gather info and plan an attack....

Usual question still ringing in ear... why oh why oh why.... Vista... great sales pitch... but why can we have the support for that we want as an operating system...

Stephen.

 

I just cant seem to get this card into the laptop, whithout breaking the warrenty and taking it appart..... I sorry I didnt want to sound glib... but if I dont try and laugh at this prob.... I'm gonna cry and stamp my feet... well if I dont she will....

Stephen...

 

There should be a BIG warning on new Vista-Installed machines warning owners of the pitfalls regarding NO XP DRIVERS FOR THIS HARDWARE!!!! on every boot up.

This topic is becoming more and more prevelant across all the help forums I contribute to.

Of course Microslop or the vendors wouldn't do this as they're "pushing" Vista.
Too bad though. SO many people are doing this and having to either revert back or buy new hardware (sound and NIC seems to be the biggest hazards).

This;
http://blimptv.blogspot.com/2007/11/vista-sucks.html

is basically correct in it's content.

 

MSFT = Microsoft ? ?

My intent wasn't to "blame" anyone of anything. My entire point was the frequency of which people are reverting back to XP from new, factory installed, Vista machines. And the driver trap that they are falling into without researching the consequences first. I'm just saying that it's too bad more people don't "look before they leap". That's all.

"... if the 3rd party developers of hardware do not wish to develope drivers for Vista for older HW then its out of MSFTs control,... "

As I stated above, XP drivers for newer hardware isn't really the issue. The issue is the Vista O/S. A percentage of people (which seems to be growing weekly/daily?) aren't happy with it and are reverting. Drivers are just a consequence of it.

"The biggest hurdle MSFT have to cross is public perception, and many need to not read junk forum or blog posts which more depict how the betas were performing over the RTM,... "

Vista on new machines isn't BETA any longer. It's the RTM Vista that people "don't seem to be" happy with.

I fully agree that BETA releases (of anything) are solely "on experimental ground", which is why I won't run any BETA releases on any "working" machine. It's the bugs reported from the BETA "testers" that get worked out (hopefully) for the RTM.

It's my opinion only, that the fact remains that disenchantment with the O/S is evident. Look at the thread title....

 

OP put in his first post, "PCI Express and PCI bus interface". I knew that couldn't be the same size interface slot as a desktop machine's mobo, but thought maybe that would allow an install of a laptop sized pci card, but I guess there really isn't such a thing.

Halo, it's not only irate newbies who don't like Vista. I subscribe to six computer magazines and I can easily find 4 or 5 articles by regular mag writers, including, for example, John Dvorak, who don't like Vista and have stated they've removed it and gone back to XP on at least some of their machines.

We have Vista on one laptop and while my gf is relatively inexperienced with computers I've been tinkering with them since Radio Shack TRS-80 Model 1 days. While Vista does feature some improvements I've found XP to be remarkably stable. I still have an XP installation running that was first installed in 2003! My main complaint is that, with good security software that's kept updated, XP works fine for me. I can't justify spending the additional money that upgrading to Vista would cost me. Then again, as a matter of principle and economy, I generally try to skip every other iteration of the Windows OS cycle. There's just no need for me to spend the extra time and money to jump on a new bandwagon each time MS says "Jump." And it's not only the money for the new OS. I'd have to spend still more money on upgrades or completely brand new application software. And there are usually quite a few old favorite games I lose each time I move on to a new OS. Not everything will run satisfactorily in compatibility mode.

 

"Dont blame MSFT fo rall of this as drivers are not their domain if the 3rd party developers of hardware do not wish to develope drivers for Vista fo rolder HW then its out of MSFTs control, the HW makers are just as cash greedy as MSFT for profits and wish you to buy newer HW, or if you wish to downgrade then swap new for old.

With new hardware Vista will out perform Xp in regards to stabilty all the time, case in point I have used all OSes and I'm not a novice at this, but XP did in RTM form crash on me a fair bit until SP1, but Vista in RTM form with compat HW and Software has not crashed once needing a re-install in now 1yr 4 months and I installed SP1 Vista in Feb.

The biggest hurdle MSFT have to cross is public perception, and many need to not read junk forum or blog posts which more depict how the betas were performing over the RTM, sadly MSFT in my opinion should have NOT released any beta version for public* consumption as this created these negative posts plus the hardware vendor driver and old favoured software working, at present many popular software titles have been updated to work, but not all."
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Excuse me Halo, but how does the above quote from one of your posts in this very thread contribute in any direct way to a solution to the OP's problem? If you want to editorialize and defend MS in a thread, you can't cry foul if someone else (or several someones) wants to disagree -- especially if you, in effect, characterize anyone who doesn't like Vista as people who've only seen the beta version and have been primarily influenced by "junk forum or blog posts". I say it ain't so. Has this forum become a "If you don't love MS leave it" forum? Please advise. If it has I'll go elsewhere. As you're a forum administrator I guess you can speak to that question.

 

Guy's....Guy's... please!!!.....
A bit of history to this event might clear the air a bit.:cool

As first said...... She who must be obeyed... the current now misses, decided to buy a Laptop just after Chrimbo. She as the use of a work system, but, going online from outside the work place is frowned upon. That in a nut shell is Company policyrolleyes.

WOOHOO... January sales (2008)... into mega store, pimple aced sales boy who in reality know less than the buyer... (shes ignorant of this fact and bulls**t baffels and work's) ..... Her request... Large HDD... Lots of memory, for use at home on wirless and I work with XP at the moment:cool.

In the time passed, the system has devalued by £200 at the same store.

She paid a seperate fee to have it setup and secured... it came with Norton 360. But as I found it at the end of Feb (2008) having problems, there was noting set up in any form of automatic scheduling (updates, scans, defrag or clean up system) and for whatever happend how it was not caught.... a trojan did make its way there and it was all going to pot...

OK... My girlfriend is not daft... she has a really good job and has worked hard to get where she is.

But she has a severe Dyslexic problem, thus she runs Dragon Software. She has all the setup disks for XP and had got the Vista version, but alas between interface and the whole confusion for her using Vista when the crunch came she asked if she could have XP on there as she found it easier to work with over all.

Now we have all spent hours if not days on occasion searching and trying drivers for all different hardware, I think the main thing that we have all been used to is that the normal run of .... Newer... Better.... Faster..... still alowed us to find drivers for all the hardware in use even if we wanted to use obsolete software.... its funny that last year... now... we get asked to check our systems to see if its Vista capable... but no one says your Vista system wont be pre Vista O/S capable. Something I think is what we are all sadley finding out to our and others expence.

Ying and Yang are alive and well in all things, for some... Hail Vista and :cry damn Vista. Whats abhorant is the Lack of choice has not been advertised or noted on the systems manafactured but it was if you wanted to upgrade your system to Vista.

I personaly have found that the people who are just coming onboard to IT and are using Vista....:drool love it... but the majority of those I know, who have trod the route of DOS, MS3.1, Windows95-98 and so on, like that which we have become used to, But more over we could work with all of them with relative back up and availability to drivers and software needed.

I'm not knocking Vista... but for me it has become very restrictive and the interface leaves a lot to be desired, my issues are more on a personal level... and software as we all know isnt produced for the individual personal preferences.

Anyway... my 2p's worth.

And guys!!!... please keep the help comming... going back to Vista.. is not our personal preference.

Thanks for listening, reading and bareing with us.

Stephen.

 

Since Vista to XP is clearly of interest to lots of people, did you consider simply emasculating the Vista back to XP?
You can get it to behave pretty similarly to XP, so long as you don't mind a green welcome screen with a horizontally arranged user list instead of a blue one with a vertical list.

What exactly did you not like about Vista?

 

In all honesty.... No... never even entered my thoughts... but as trojan was present and the hope of XP was voiced... did the dreaded jump in both feet and havent landed yet....doh... but your suggestion is making its way to top of list...

Thank you...

Have to think about the why exactly... not sure is it just a set in ways... old dog an all that...or anyone specific problem.

Stephen.

 

I read most of this, but wanted to get to the end. Is the only driver problem still audio?
If it is then try this:
1) Uninstall the Realtek software through Add/Remove Programs (if it's installed but not working)
2) In Device Manager, remove the High Definition audio device (or the unknown device, if there is one) under Sound, Video & Game controllers.
3) Go into Device Manager>System, right click the UAA Hi-Def Bus driver.
Disable the device and then uninstall it. (Do not re-boot yet)
KB888111
If you install, remove, and then re-install this update, the update is no longer listed in Add or Remove Programs in Control Panel. Therefore, you cannot remove this update from your computer. To work around this problem, follow these steps.
1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and then click OK.
2. Locate and then click the following subkey in the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Updates\Windows XP\SP2\KB888111 (the part in red may differ a little, the important thing is to remove the KB888111 registry entry)
3. On the Edit menu, click Delete.
4. Click Yes, and then exit Registry Editor.
Run CCleaner, both the Cleaner and Registry.
http://www.majorgeeks.com/CCleaner_Slim_No_Yahoo_Toolbar_English_d4191.html

Download this driver at Realtek,. The UAA is included.
Windows 2000, Windows XP/2003(32/64 bits) Driver only (ZIP file)
http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads...=24&Level=4&Conn=3&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false
Unzip the file and double click the setup.exe file.
That should install your driver, then do a complete shut down and re-boot.
If that doesn't get it working:
Download this .zip file, unpack it into your folder of choice.
Go to Control Panel>Device Manager> PCI Device>Update Driver> choose the folder where you extracted it then you have to find the .sys file from the UAA HD Add-on folder and other .sys from Realtek's driver folder and then just boot and it'll automatically activate it.

UAA HD Add-on.zip


EDIT: There is a Read Me included in the package. It wouldn't hurt to go through it. It refers to a CD, but just consider the driver package the CD.

 

yes I noiced this on another post... thanks for drawing my attention back to it... will try it.
Yes...just the Audio a prob at this time... Cant get hands on system till weekend now... will let you know how it goes

Stephen

 

If by chance you can't do a step, because an item isn't in Device Manager, just keep going until you reach the end. Some of the steps are just precautionary, to get the interference out of the way.
Good Luck!

 

Hi Guy's... I'm back.... lol... have hands on system...(Laptop)... going to try now all and everything thats been advised... any other help... as all ways received with thanks...

Stephen.

 

WOOHOO...... Special thanks to MUSKSNIPE....

All though it didnt work his Advice was intstremental and the back bone of getting the Audio to work... The Driver Package worked great....Had to do the registery deletes.. but after 1st try and fail... thought S**t or bust it can go back for return to spec install... if all fail...

So went into registery and did a pretty comprehensive searc and deleted anything Audio...


Also deleted the Asus ATK0100 ACPI Utility.....
Installed the R188 Driver.... as it shut down I had sound... on restart it found the ATK0100 ACPI and installed... wahhhhhhaaayyy... I have everything up and running in XP... Device manager... clean and green...


Also... have been advised by she who must be obeyed....lol... that the statement previous..... the present and current, misses... has been upgraded to the, permanent and life long misses.....

Anyway... to all, thanks again.. will be stopping by regular in the hope that I can return the effort and favours.

Stephen.

 

http://www.freesmileys.org/smileys/signs088.gif
Thanks for the tip on the registry. I never thought of a complete look through for some of those that are having a complete failure in reinstalling their sound.

 

hi can someone hellp me please ive got the same laptop and ive got no sound ive done all the directions it says on this laptop and downloaded everything still no progress can some1 help me please with the right drivers for xp