Hi everyone, I've got a new Power Spec Pentium 4 Windows XP machine the OS of which I want to downgrade to Win 98SE. I'd do it myself, but all I've got in terms of drivers are in the recovery disks that came with the computer. I don't have much time to get this done, particularly in the fair likelihood of my screwing it up, so I'm looking for a computer repair place in Houston that won't charge me an arm and a leg to get this done and most importantly can get it done within one day. Anyone got any recommendations? (Feel free to plug yourselves, if you have/work at such a place). As I've said, I'm holding back from doing it myself because I don't know where to get all the drivers. If I'd assembled the machine together myself, it would be a different story. I've got Partition Magic 7.0 which is great for a lot of tasks, but I still have to get all the drivers, and I'm afraid of missing something or getting the wrong one. I'd rather a professional do it who I can hold accountable. But if anyone has recommendations for how I could do this myself, I'm open to that too.
You want to downgrade it, but keep all of the data? Or you just want it reformatted and to install Win98? Why not 2000? WinXP isn't that bad... It is better than Win98.
It may cost a fair penny (ask a time and cost estimation before you leave it there), but I know the folks at Lightspeed can do it for you. I used to work there. If you see David or Cy, tell them Mark sent you. Rate used to be $60 an hour. I don't know if it still is, but I KNOW they can have it done in a day -- that's the specialty there. It's at 5302 Bellaire Blvd. Across the street from Burger King, and in between a bank and Firestone. The website is at: http://www.golightspeed.com
I don't have too much data I want to keep. There's only a couple important applications on there, and I can probably take care of them myself. A clean install is really all I need. I use the computer to support a specific video application I've got. The XP version doesn't work too well, so I'm going back to the older version that only runs on '98 and older.
You should be able to get the drivers online - possibly from the manufacturers site. Why not try to do it yourself and take it to them only if you fail? I guess if you aren't too familiar with it then you might be better off paying.
I agree with Sonny -- download the drivers you need first, then it shouldn't be too hard at all. If you do have a problem, then take it to Lightspeed and they can do a Windows 98SE install for you pretty easily.
Of course, some companies are a bit slow in getting out their new XP drivers. I know I have a video capture program (made by Pinnacle Systems) that didn't have a new XP driver last time I went to look. And the program doesn't work with XP at all. Fortunately, I was able to work around the problem (the Pinnacle program only did capture, and I can uyse Premiere to capture directly), but the Pinnacle program did help make some things easier and I kind of miss it (not enough to downgrade to 98, though).
