My daughter has a Dell Studio 540 running Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit and she's been asking me if it's OK to upgrade to Windows 10. Since I live several hundred miles from her I didn't want to tell her to go ahead until I had a chance to check things out and now I'm wondering myself what to do.
I fired up some Dell utility for drivers and updates and it came back with a message that said the Studio 540 had not been tested for compatibility with Windows 10 and if an upgrade was attempted things might not work. Of course that doesn't really mean they won't it only means that Dell hasn't tested anything and they're covering themselves just in case. Now The Windows Upgrade Icon is in her system tray and it says that the machine was tested and found to be compatible with no issues found so drivers might exist from Microsoft.
So, has anyone upgraded a Dell Studio 540? If so, what if any problems did you encounter?
Microsoft is often provided with drivers not designed specifically for the computer, which means updating is risky. It probably will work, but you always run the risk of crashing, or small problems like it having a hard time coming out of sleep mode, etc.
If she really wants it, she can try it out, and revert back if it doesn't work in month provided to revert.
To remove the tray icon, do this: Get Windows 10 Icon - Remove from Taskbar in Windows 7 and 8.1 - Windows 10 blog
From the Dell web site:
Product not tested for Windows 10 upgrade
Dell is not testing or developing Windows 10 drivers for this product. If you choose to upgrade, some features, applications, and connected devices may not work as expected.
See a list of tested products
Since Dell doesn't support the machine for Windows 10, that means that you (and your daughter) are on your own.
That means finding drivers for all of the components in the PC. The Windows 10 installer may have most or all of them, but you can't count on that. In particular, it may give you the Microsoft Basic drivers for the graphics device, which will run but with poor performance.
I can't really recommend the upgrade. If the machine was running Windows 8, I'd suggest it. (I really disliked the Win 8 interface.)
If she decides to go for it, I strongly recommend that she image the existing Windows 7 installation, if she wants (or needs) to go back. The Win 10 upgrade has means to revert, but I don't trust them.
I went to Dell's driver support page and found that Dell didn't even provide driver support for Windows 8.x so to me that pretty much seals the deal on the upgrade being a big fat NO. If it were me and I had the original Windows 7 restore CD from Dell or Acronis TrueImage and an external backup source I might try it but she doesn't know where anything is and I only have another couple of days to fool with this before I return home to Florida so I'm thinking that the best course of action is to find the instructions on disabling the Windows 10 nag and let her stay on Windows 7.I can't really recommend the upgrade. If the machine was running Windows 8, I'd suggest it. (I really disliked the Win 8 interface.).
My experience so far is daily BSOD crashes from an errant AMD driver. As with your Dell 540, my system is not supported by Dell for Win 10 issues. I will likely go back to Win 7. Just need to figure out how after several months on Win 10.
I upgraded my wife's Dell 540 to windows 10 and had no errors. She is very happy with it.My experience so far is daily BSOD crashes from an errant AMD driver. As with your Dell 540, my system is not supported by Dell for Win 10 issues. I will likely go back to Win 7. Just need to figure out how after several months on Win 10.
Walt
If the PC has the option to upgrade it will be fine. This is just Dell trying to sell more computers.
