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I have old, old Samsung R780 laptop. In excellent condition, I want it to be used as a mobile entertainment - DVD player, internet, streaming etc, not just by me. No gaming of any sort with possible exception of browser games or candy crush etc.

So I assume i3-430 with 4GB of RAM and Geforce 330 will be good enough for the job.

However, the issue I have is that when restored laptop to initial state (it was set up after first boot, so no issues here) I can't do much updating. Can do drivers in general (obviously to some extent only, but still), but I want it upgraded from existing W7 to W10. And this has issues, presumably due to old BIOS. Unfortunately update is not possible. Samsung in their wisdom used internet installer, which checks and then downloads appropriate software from server.

So both Samsung Update Plus and BIOS update isn't working. The problem may be connection related - there are some issues that prevent browsers from connecting to websites - but more likely the software is no longer there. I've downloaded and installed newer Samsung Update software, but this one, in turn, does not recognise the model (reads S/N correctly, but model is not on the list).

I've asked some pointed questions in email to Samsung Customer Support, but for last several days the silence is deafening.

Are there any alternative resources I can go to to get this sorted out? Dell has a nice site where all old stuff sits; is there something similar in Samsung case?

I would prefer not using third party sites that offer whole host of drivers for that machine - no way for me to validate if the packages haven't been tampered with. I will not use the laptop for any sensitive data, but no point in being stupid.

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  • Why not use Linux (and Kodi)?
    – davidgo
    Commented Aug 31, 2019 at 11:10
  • I should be more precise in the question. It's not exactly for me. So I have to consider other factors. While I'm personally not biased (in fact using a raspberry Pi at home for certain things), but need to consider other persons' skills. So no, W10 it is for now. Also, amended question.
    – AcePL
    Commented Aug 31, 2019 at 23:20
  • You can try identifying the generic hardware versions and searching the component OEM sites for drivers.
    – music2myear
    Commented Sep 1, 2019 at 11:34
  • However, especially for laptops, BIOS are likely to be heavily customized and it may not be possible to get a BIOS that works from a non-Samsung source.
    – music2myear
    Commented Sep 1, 2019 at 11:35

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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Computer was for user who's sole usage was multimedia (TIR truck driver) and social media, so factory reset was enough. On default drivers it managed to play 4k Youtube video without stutter (display was 1080p, so can't tell if it actually worked), so user deemed it adequate and didn't do anything fancy with it.

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