Install XP on a Laptop with I7 processor

fortytwo · May 15, 2020

I have a Dell laptop with a 4k touch screen, but the colors are starting to wash out in part of the screen. I also have a new Plustek 7600 slide scanner that Plustek never chose to develop drivers for MS OS's beyond XP. Since I'm quarantined thru mid July (caregiver for wife in an Assisted Living joint) I have time to attack my 3,000 plus collection of 35mm slides. I have purchased a CD of XP Professional "For Refurbishing PC's". Can I do a clean install (now has Win 10. I've copied all the files I need) of XP. Win 10 is the only OS that has been on this laptop. One possible glitch could be that this laptop does not have a floppy or optical drive. I do have USB drives for both formats. Alternatively, can XP be installed on a USB thumb drive and used as a boot drive; or can I copy the DVD to a Thumb Drive and install from it?

BTW, I replaced the Dell with an HP All-in-One with a 4k 32 inch screen. Fabulous! Except the included KB & mouse are chrome book grade and the allegedly 4 internal microphones are garbled. Both replaceable but shouldn't have to do that. Setting up a new PC reinforced why I hate Win 10's design to obsolete old software. Wish I wasn't too old to have the time to learn Linux.

Ray,IN · May 15, 2020

Linux has software that mimics windows 10, I installed it on an old laptop that was not capable of running W10. It runs great. I gave that laptop to a grandson last fall, he's never complained about it not being windows OS.

SWharton · May 15, 2020

Why don't you just have your slides scanned in by Walmart(not sure if they do it). Whoever does it usually enhances the slides also.

k4rs · May 15, 2020

I believe your biggest problem may be finding XP drivers for your computer. Micro$oft has worked real hard with OEM's to make it very difficult to install anything but Windows 10 on a modern PC. I think your best bet would be to hit the thrift shops and pawn shops to find an old XP era computer. I am sure they are available at very low cost. When you are done with your project it will make a good platform to learn Linux with.

Safe Travels (or not)...

Oops - I just re-read your post and noticed the quarantine part. Makes it difficult to hit the thrift shops but you may find something online.

Edited May 15, 2020 by k4rs

Chalkie · May 15, 2020

Are you aware that Windows 10 can run in compatibility mode which allows it to emulate older versions of WIndows? No need to load XP at all.

fortytwo · May 15, 2020

Chalkie, I found a reference to running an XP emulator in Win7, but Microsoft has removed that software from their site. The problem I have is that Plustek deliberately obsoleted their hardware by not developing Win 10 drivers. I found a site claiming to have one but download was a rental with a substantial monthly fee. I have an older HP 2000 laptop/tablet with XP in a dual boot - that won't boot due to a missing driver but I can't get out to a guru shop to attempt repair - and an older Gateway. The challenge with any older hardware is finding one with enough processing power to scan thousands of slides taken over a 40 year period. I have a flatbed scanner, but individually loading 4 per scan and then processing the output is a monumental task I no longer have motivation for.

SWharton, All the commercial services I have found would charge several thousand dollars for the volume I have.

I may have to concede defeat and buy a new scanner. After all I did give up and retire 5 1/4 and 3 1/2 floppy drives (still have a few disks though) and my Zip drive.

Lou Schneider · May 17, 2020

Unless it's designed with a light in the lid to scan slides, a flatbed scanner just reflects light off of the surface of a slide. You'll get better quality with a purpose made slide scanner that projects light through the slide, the way it was intended to be viewed.

I scanned my father's slide collection last summer using a Kodak Scanza slide converter. The price wasn't bad and the feeder tray made it easy to insert the slides one at a time while pushing out the previous scanned slide.

Edited May 17, 2020 by Lou Schneider

DanZemke · May 17, 2020

Quote

All the commercial services I have found would charge several thousand dollars for the volume I have. I may have to concede defeat and buy a new scanner.

After poking around on what's available for slide scanning, I agree. Frustrating, but IMO, it's time to move on. I too trashed all my floppies and zipdrives and my first computer (an Apple II).

This seems to be a reasonable possibility (I have no personal experience with it). And you may be able to sell it for 30-50% of your cost (assuming it is still working after scanning 3000 slides).

https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00O46B7TY/ezvid02-20

P.S. I don't usually buy product insurance policies. But if I were in your shoes, I might consider the $22 one for the linked product. Your needed volume of slides is probably much higher than their average customer. Assuming the terms do not exempt your protection for "excessive" usage, it may be a reasonable hedge.

Edited May 17, 2020 by DanZemke
additional suggestion

Jaydrvr · May 17, 2020

1 hour ago, DanZemke said:

After poking around on what's available for slide scanning, I agree. Frustrating, but IMO, it's time to move on. I too trashed all my floppies and zipdrives and my first computer (an Apple II).

This seems to be a reasonable possibility (I have no personal experience with it). And you may be able to sell it for 30-50% of your cost (assuming it is still working after scanning 3000 slides).

https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00O46B7TY/ezvid02-20

P.S. I don't usually buy product insurance policies. But if I were in your shoes, I might consider the $22 one for the linked product. Your needed volume of slides is probably much higher than their average customer. Assuming the terms do not exempt your protection for "excessive" usage, it may be a reasonable hedge.

The one linked to at Amazon doesn't give any resolution or color depth specs, pretty much confirming that it's barely more than a toy. It may be just fine for some, but personally I would want the best scans possible of all my film images. It's a lot of work to scan thousands of slides or negatives, so you may as well get the best results available for the time invested. Good luck with whatever you decide. Jay

DanZemke · May 17, 2020

Quote

The one linked to at Amazon doesn't give any resolution or color depth specs, pretty much confirming that it's barely more than a toy. It may be just fine for some, but personally I would want the best scans possible of all my film images. It's a lot of work to scan thousands of slides or negatives, so you may as well get the best results available for the time invested. Good luck with whatever you decide. Jay

An Epson V800 costs about $800, will resolve 6400 dpi, when scanning 35 mm slides. It also costs about 4x as much as the linked device and is very cumbersome to use for lots of slides. And it's MUCH slower. And it too, is only supported up to Windows XP. IMO, that's a pretty clear indication that there is no longer a viable market for consumer slide/photo scanners.

DPI and color depth can be important specs for scanners, but they are pretty much useless for devices like the linked one. It's not a scanner. It's a camera sensor in a box with a light, preview screen and some controls. It's specs say it uses a 20MP camera sensor and that the resolution max is 5472 x 3648. But that information isn't very useful in differentiating likely output quality from other devices.

I still think that the linked device, or some other sensor-based one, is a better fit for his needs than a scanner. But I also suspect that you're right, and that for some slides, higher quality would be worth paying for.

To the original poster: Suggest you buy something like the linked device and digitized all of your slides with it (maybe weeding some out via a preview screen). For those that you wished were higher quality, send them to a service to get them.

Chalkie · May 18, 2020

On 5/15/2020 at 5:48 PM, fortytwo said:

Chalkie, I found a reference to running an XP emulator in Win7, but Microsoft has removed that software from their site. The problem I have is that Plustek deliberately obsoleted their hardware by not developing Win 10 drivers.

Seriously, before giving up and wiping Windows 10, please, try loading the software that you have and then "right click" and choose to run it compatibility mode. Give it a try! The worse that can happen is that is does not work and you need to uninstall it.

Edited May 18, 2020 by Chalkie

Vladimir · May 18, 2020

I just upgraded my computers from Windows 2000 to XP.

Those are the ones that run the telescopes and camera’s in the observatory. As others have mentioned you need scanners and items from that era. In my case, I am not going to pay 5,000 dollars to upgrade all my equipment!!!!

Windows 7 is great. I might upgrade to that soon in the observatory. I do use Windows 7 for my photography and general purpose computing.

I am trying to get a refurbished computer with Windows 10, but it seems that with the pandemic the refurbished market is sold out.

There are some real advantages to being behind the curve.

fortytwo · May 18, 2020

Thanks for all the suggested options. It seems vendors have determined that it's not profitable to provide a solution to those of us who have thousands of slides from the pre-digital era. I have an older flatbed scanner that could scan at an acceptable resolution, but don't have the motivation to invest that much time.

Revisited the site that was providing drivers on a subscription basis and they are now selling it. https://www.hamrick.com/

They also offer a 30 day free trial so will try that first. Their ad does seem a bit over optimistic though. It's really a need for a driver that works with Win 10. If the Hamrick solution doesn't work I'll probably take the suggested route of a fast, but lower quality solution followed by commercial rescan of a much smaller number of the best slides.

1st though, just realized that tax filing deferment is ending soon, and being one of the great procrastinators I have that to do.