[ADOBE NO WORKEY] Jack's insane Windows 7 10920X driver installation journey (has ended)

Software & Operating Systems Windows
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My mobo is the X299 Aorus Gaming 7 Pro, my processor is the i9-10920X, and my memory is G.Skill Flare X.

In failing to find SSDT and DSDT help (and the fact Titan Ridge is another headache for High Sierra running Hack iMac Pro) I took my Windows 7 installation reserved for Premiere and migrated it to X299.

Knowing the USB 3.0 chipset ports don’t work on 7 OOTB, I used a PS/2 mouse. It worked. I was able to navigate installers using a PS/2 mouse to get the chipset drivers and USB 3.0 drivers installed. This in the very least works on X299. Hopefully if it’s a supported SuperIO chip it will also work on Ryzen.

Once the USB 3.0 drivers were installed, USB mice and keyboards work again and I proceeded to install the rest of the drivers:

Success:
Intel Chipset Driver (from Gigabyte)
Intel USB 3.0 XHCI driver (from Techspot/Hardware Unboxed)
ASMedia ASM3142 driver (from Startech)
Nvidia drivers (pre-installed, Windows managed to re-install properly after INF updates)
Intel RST driver (from Gigabyte)
Hotfix for RST (from Gigabyte)
Realtek Audio (from Gigabyte, since Realtek themselves have pulled HD audio driver installation from their official site)
Intel i219-V Ethernet (from Intel)
Intel Management Engine (HECI)

Not tried:
Atheros Killer NIC E2500 (Not using it, Killer Networks stuff increases DPC Latency)
Atheros Killer WiFi 1535 (swapped it out for a AX200 due to same DPC Latency concerns)
Performance counters for DDRIO (8086:2088) (Dell apparently offers an INF update that fixes this, but haven’t tried it because the utility was targeted for Win10)

Unsuccessful:
Intel AX200 M.2 WiFi (Windows 10 exclusive)
Gigabyte Titan Ridge card (Windows 10 exclusive)

Digressing:
Latest HWinfo64 installed fine and correctly identified the processor as a 10920X.
Windows Experience Index crashed at the memory test because 24 cores is too many cores.
Nvidia Control Panel’s 3D preview is broken.

But the big one:
NONE OF THE ADOBE APPS WORK.

TL;DR: Having a PS/2 mouse and keyboard helps you get the USB 3.0 drivers onto your Windows 7 installation much easier. It’s only boards with no PS/2 ports that require something like a 2 machine + Task Scheduler silent installation.

So, gonna assume the AX200, Titan Ridge and Adobe CC are impossible to run on Windows 7.

Why did I do this? Because this was easier to setup than High Sierra with extensive DSDT and SSDT modifications. Unfortunately with the Adobe apps not working, it means I have to go High Sierra.

This was done on a spare installation so none of my mission critical work got destroyed, but learning this means I am screwed.

The Dell INF is here if you’re interested in running Cascade Lake-X with all the INF entries updated properly: https://www.dell.com/support/article/en-us/sln317623/errors-displayed-in-windows-10-windows-device-manager-after-a-intel-cascade-lake-processor-upgrade-on-precision-7820-7920-workstations

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Only way I’ll try driver installation for Titan Ridge and the AX200 is Windows 10 AME. That’s the only version of 10 I would even dare installing bare metal.

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Extremely disappointing news:

X299 and Windows 7 (or 8.1) means none of your Adobe CC apps work.

There is no solution to this problem. Not unless you get self-entitled “just accept you’re gonna be tracked” people saying “Just move to Windows 10, you idiot.”

I’m having a panic attack. This cements that I need to move to High Sierra with extensive DSDT and SSDT modifications because I will have no editing rig otherwise.

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Adobe CC was unfortunately also the reason I had to abandon 8.1.

From the perspective as a normie-pleb that just likes to point-and-click (my seldom Linux excursions have always been in the same vein as Ryan’s recent TrueNAS Core video) I have to stay on Windows and macOS.

Fortunately, in Germany courts decided that you can (legally) purchase* all kinds of Windows editions as an end customer, so I got 10 Enterprise were you can disable that telemetry shit.

*No, not like these eBay listings USD 5.00, a proper store that was already “visited” by MS some time ago and is still operating so it seems to be legit is Lizengo ( https://www.lizengo.de/microsoft/windows-10-betriebssystem ).

It is also supplying state customers (German Armed Forces, German Railways services) with licences so at this point in time it doesn’t seem to be blatant piracy.

You can pay via Credit card, PayPal or Amazon pay so it should be possible to make a purchase there outside of Germany (prices include VAT).

You’ll get an email with your licence keys and an ISO download link, alternatively you can just use custom cmd line tool commands to create an Enterprise ISO with Microsoft’s official Media Creation Tool that only creates Home/Pro ISOs by default.

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LTSB still only likes signed drivers. There could be edge cases where I need to test a new Blackmagic driver and then LTSB won’t let me.

BTW, Newer versions of Premiere are super sensitive to bad audio drivers, especially the default HD Audio drivers.

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But that’s been around since Vista x64. So I don’t see why win 10 ltsb would be any different than win 7.

True, Windows 10 does prefer whql signed drivers, but that requirement can be easily bypassed if you have secure boot off or you set

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CI\Policy]
"UpgradedSystem"=dword:00000001
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While you can choose an LTSB version “Enterprise” (Ent/Edu are the editions that can be operated in harmony with GDPR with the temetry being disabled) you can just get a regular Enterprise version that’s subject to the same 2-major-upgrades-per-year cycle.

Edit: Goddamn, Lizengo is currently down after some hackers had their way.