[D Hook]

Just bought a new laptop and it came with Win 7 64 bit, which is causing problems for some of my printers. I use large format printers, HP 5000 and HP 5500 and 750C plus so they're not exactly something I want to have to replace. I don't absolutely NEED the laptop to print from them but would like it if it could.

Is it possible to replace the laptop OS with XP 32 bit? Or even Win 7 32 bit? Or even (gulp) Vista 32bit. Or does the OS have to be 64 bit? This is a Toshiba L675-S7801.

Pardon my ignorance please. Thanks for any help and information.

 

[oscer1]

hi D Hook,

you can go with 32 bit system, your ram would be limited. if you went with xp you might have a hard time finding drivers for your hardware, would have to check toshiba's web site if thy have the drivers. would your printers work with windows 7 32 bit? that what i would use.

 

[D Hook]

Thanks for the reply.

If I did this, I'd probably roll back to XP 32. HP doesn't help any by not supplying drivers for their older machines but I can understand why they don't want to.

Yes, finding XP drivers would be a challenge for the laptop hardware. Using Belarc I can find all the hardware names and model numbers so should help tracking down drivers. I already have a sealed copy of Win7 32bit but HP doesn't support that much either for their older printers.

What about losing RAM? I guess I'm unsure of the physical differences between 32 bit and 64 bit systems.

BTW, I tried this with a previous Toshiba laptop that had Vista. I wanted to roll back to XP and asked Toshiba for help, to which they replied a very emphatic "NO". Ended up searching this sight and a couple others and found an entire package of drivers just for that purpose. Great site!

Thanks and any other insight would be appreciated. Beginning to think getting the 64bit system might cause some major headache$.

 

[sobeit]

You will not find xp drivers for many of the newer laptops. they just dont create them anymore. Also remember, going back to xp will also void portions of your warranty.

Did you go to hp and search for specific drivers for those printers? I was there and there were win7 drivers for both hp 5000 and 5500. there were also vista drivers for the 750 and most likely it will work with win7.

 

[D Hook]

Yes, I did visit HP site. Am trying to use the Vista 64bit driver for the 750. So far no luck but I'll keep trying. I had similar issues with a previous Toshiba that was runnning Vista 32 before it was stolen so I know it can be a pain to get the laptop to talk to the printers but I managed to get that one to work.

Thanks for your suggestions and info on the XP drivers. I knew it would be a challenge. May have to just work with win7 64.

 

[oscer1]

What about losing RAM? I guess I'm unsure of the physical differences between 32 bit and 64 bit systems.

32 bit will only be able to use 3.2 gb while 64 will use all.

 

[brobarapas]

keep your current o/s installed,partition your hard drive,now install your new o/s on the new partition,choose what you want to install , weather it be xp,vista ,or windows 7 32 bit,that way you can still keep your current o/s ,If you install xp on the new partition you will have a small problem,once you boot up you will only see xp and not windows 7 64 bit,you must install the older system first and then the latest in order to notice both of them at boot up times,this can easily be fixed if you install xp now while your running 64 bit ,after you install xp boot from the windows 7 disc,choose repair my computer,the disc will load the boot migr,restart your machine ,you will now see xp,and seven and boot up