Sunday 28 November 2010

old HP nx9005 - Win7

Finally I have Windows 7... installed on an old nx9005 - perfectly good laptop with a working OS... bit worn around the edges.. but why should I throw it?  The only thing that I've had to do with it in the past is install a new HD.. cos the Fujitsu one in there before developed the strange clicking problem... and I lost everything on it.. or perhaps I didn't .. I'm keeping it just in case, but I reckon it's got about 5 seconds of read time left if it ever does boot up because of my insistence on taken things apart .. :)

Maybe i can just replace the read head with an exact same disk.. ?  I'm sure there's a disk recovery place somewhere in Ireland or Wales that can retrieve data from clicking drives.. I read a review once...

Anyway.. drivers.. Conexant AC97 - wouldn't work in Win7... and HP are rubbish, they won't even develop anything for the nx9005... which is really really stupid... because the solution I found on MSDN Social Forum is merely a change in ONE LINE...  why on earth HP can't simply re-package the driver as Win7, with a single line edit (like I reckon MS used to do with DLLs between major Window's versions) .. Is it just down to Windows Compatibility signing?  My system didn't seem to care...

The solution is on here... by Mr. Raven...
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/itprovistahardware/thread/2857c5ef-bc13-49ce-bdd8-99bddb7d6b10/

It simply involves downloading the driver from HP - unpack and don't install:
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareDownloadIndex?softwareitem=ob-31530-1&lc=en&cc=us&dlc=en&product=1816346&os=228&lang=en

Then edit the INF file... find the [Conexant] section and add a new line with the PCI bus enum that Win7 has assigned to your sound card... can be found in System Properties -> Device Manager -> open Sound Device -> Details tab -> Hardware Ids from the drop-down.  Mine now looks like this:


[Conexant]
%*WDM_AMCAUD.DeviceDesc%=WDM_AMCAUD,PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_4370&SUBSYS_3091103C
%*WDM_AMCAUD.DeviceDesc%=WDM_AMCAUD,PCI\VEN_10B9&DEV_5451&SUBSYS_0024103C

So I wonder could you do that with most drivers?  I guess you could try... Download the WindowsXP driver, find the INF file.. find the manufacturer section [Conexant] ... and add the new line...

Only a few things change drastically between versions of Windows... and then they're re-marketed...

DrWatson was really quite useful in Windows 3.0... Windows 3.1... Windows for Workgroups... and then Windows 95 came along.

As I installed it, I was told that Windows 95 now comes with new! Dr Watson which would handle crashes...  rubbish... Windows Server 2003... comes with DrWatson....

Windows XP: [system32]\dwwin.exe 10.0.5815.0 - Microsoft Application Error Reporting - Original file = DW.exe
and DrWtsn32.exe - which has a user interface... for reading dumps... I couldn't find a dump to read...

Microsoft were originally going to call this Sherlock...  wonder why they didn't... maybe they couldn't get it past their legal team...

Apparently DrWatson has now been replaced by Problem Reports and Solutions...  but you can still type DrWatson into Start->Run (WinKey+R) ... or dwwin ...

2 comments:

  1. Cool, thanks. Nice to know my lappy can run Win7. It's had a couple of feeble moments, (Broken keyboard and screen switching off at random and a new larger harddrive + memory at max,) but it simply refuses to give up.

    I'm running Linux as I am unnable to find a replacement XP disk that matches my OEM licence, so if I have to spend on MS, i'd try to get the latest OS.

    great article. thank you.

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  2. My nx9005 is slowly giving up but hanging in there... The screen goes off, I have to close it slightly and open it.. I think the cables have been worn down too much over the years and possibly I could fix it by buying a new screen...
    (http://www.lcds4less.co.uk/search-lcds.shtml?lcds_search=nx9005&Submit.x=0&Submit.y=0 (in the UK))

    Then an update was installed and now it's running in Safe Mode because it hangs on booting into Windows... I need some spare time to investigate which driver is stopping it from proceeding... I only use it for creating data DVDs and occasional surfing.. when I last cleaned the fan unit - (so quiet after cleaning it) - the mouse pad connector cable must have worn out.. so now the pad doesn't work, but an external mouse does...

    The one thing not working in Safe Mode is the sound.. that's a pain... and I get a SOUNDMAN.EXE error too... I'll be looking into that too.

    How is Linux? I tried Linux on an old Vaio but ended up reinstalling XP (just because I needed a basic OS with no frills for SPSS (stats program)) .. Might be a hassle on the HP getting the right drivers?

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