Attempting to install W7 on Dell XPS

My wife purchased a new Dell XPS which came with Windows 10 Home Edition. She doesn't like W10 so I'm attempting to install W7-64bit Professional.

I can boot from the W7 CD OK. It does copying files with with the white bar, then at the first screen where you select the language, etc. the installation appears to freeze; the mouse cursor disappears and the keyboard does not work either.

I read something about having to change some BIOS setting to do like a Legacy Boot and to turn off Safe Boot, but so far it does not work for me. Maybe I'm not setting the right combination of settings.

Also, the Dell factory partitions are still on the SSD C:\ drive but I don't know how to reformat/repartition.

Any thoughts? Thanks!

Welcome to the forum. Can you post a screenshot from disk manager showing all the partitions as there are a few option and we need to know the disk layout as it may be gpt or mbr disk

samuria said:

Welcome to the forum. Can you post a screenshot from disk manager showing all the partitions as there are a few option and we need to know the disk layout as it may be gpt or mbr disk

Well, that's a problem. I can't run Disk Manager because there is no working OS on the hard drive.

Right now I am burning an Ubuntu CD and I downloaded an app called GParted which I will try to use to look at the partitions.

Stay tuned.

Attached is the partition listings using that utility GParted.

My suggestion is to create the factory recover disk as you still have the recovery partitions.
Even better is to do a factory recover. Once you have Win 10 back, do a image of the entire disk and save it on an external disk.
You can launch the recovery from BIOS.
Use Macrium Software | Your Image is Everything.

You have a M.2 nvme drive. Do you have another drive?
The installation seems to freeze because you don't have USB3.x.
Win 7 installation disk doesn't have USB3.x and nvme drivers. You must add them to the installation disk.
So fist you have to find out the brand and model of the M.2 nvme drive so you can get the drivers.
Read my tutorial Create a Windows 7 USB flash installation with new drives for new MB's - Windows 7 Help Forums

SIW2 has recently helped to install win 7 on a Dell XPS

Megahertz07 said:

My suggestion is to create the factory recover disk as you still have the recovery partitions.
Even better is to do a factory recover. Once you have Win 10 back, do a image of the entire disk and save it on an external disk.
You can launch the recovery from BIOS.
Use Macrium Software | Your Image is Everything.

You have a M.2 nvme drive. Do you have another drive?
The installation seems to freeze because you don't have USB3.x.
Win 7 installation disk doesn't have USB3.x and nvme drivers. You must add them to the installation disk.
So fist you have to find out the brand and model of the M.2 nvme drive so you can get the drivers.
Read my tutorial Create a Windows 7 USB flash installation with new drives for new MB's - Windows 7 Help Forums

SIW2 has recently helped to install win 7 on a Dell XPS

Wow! Sounds like some of this is a little out of my league.

Why can't I just delete the existing partitions and create one big partition?

Suppose I replace the drive and start from scratch?

So the bottom line is I need to create a bootable USB drive and copy the Windows 7 installation files from the CD to that USB drive, and copy USB3 drivers as well. Correct?

What we are telling you is that installing Win 7 on it isn't an easy task.
- Does the XPS came with only the M.2 drive or it has a HDD?
- You should, as I wrote on post #6 and Fireberd also suggested, restore win 10 (factory restore) and do a M.2 disk Image on an external disk. If something goes wrong, you can restore as it came from Dell.
- To create a Win 7 installation disk for a M.2 nvme drive isn't a simple task. Read my tutorial.