For current, or future Dell Optiplex 3020 owners

I don't normally make posts on forums, but I've been wanting to get myself an old PC to install XP on for a few years now. I browsed Ebay and settled on an Optiplex 3020.

I suppose I should've done more research but it turns out the drivers were not supported for anything below Windows 7. I was not able to get any connection with my ethernet port. I'm not too familiar with how drivers work 100% but I scoured the internet looking for any possible way to get a working driver for the thing.

I thought to myself, "There's no Dell just creates a new driver for every single possible machine they make right?"

Turns out, they don't! The device is just a generic Realtek ethernet port driver, and I was actually able to find the correct driver on the official Realtek website here (The best solution is the simplest)

Downloaded "WinXP and Server 2003 Auto Installation Program for FE/GBE", Unzipped it, ran the setup.exe, and it just installed and worked just fine after a restart.

I can now connect my XP machine to the internet and I'm a happy camper now!

I made this thread so people in the future, if they choose to install Windows XP on a machine that "doesn't support it", perhaps this can help and I hope it does so it can save you time of searching!

 

Yes, I have often found the chip set manufacturers to be a more fruitful option for drivers than the machine assembler in regards to old kit. Particularly Nvidia, for their nForce series of motherboard chipsets and their gForce graphics hardware.

 

Easiest way to find drivers for those that don't have it is to search the PCI description in its entirety--I've found a lot of drivers over the years this way, sometimes coming from another manufacturer.

So what's your cpu and memory specs on the 3020? I have a 3020 SFF that I upgraded to a 4790k with 16GB and it screams in win7, and didn't know it could work with xp.

 

More than one way to find a driver (Thankfully). Thanks for the share.

 

I also have a 3020 SFF. Came with 4GB of ram and an i5-4570. I was going to upgrade it with a spare 8GB I had but figured there was no point. If I decide to dual boot then maybe

 

I know this thread is kinda irrelevant know, but does this also apply to audio drivers? I really want to run XP on my 3020 SFF as well and I know you mentioned that you can just use a generic Ethernet driver but does that also apply to audio drivers?