Skylake & Win 7

[John Connor]

Am I to understand that USB problems exist for only installing Win 7 via USB for Win 7? Or are there USB problems with Skylake and Win 7? I see the Gigabyte MB I was looking at has the driver. I don't plan on using USB, just a clone using sysprep. Worth a shot and if it doesn't work I'll start a fresh install. Just curious at how effective sysprep will be. But my main concern is USB in Win 7 using Skylake.

 

[NTMBK]

You can get a free Windows 10 upgrade, if you're worried about it.

 

[BigDaveX]

Am I to understand that USB problems exist for only installing Win 7 via USB for Win 7? Or are there USB problems with Skylake and Win 7? I see the Gigabyte MB I was looking at has the driver. I don't plan on using USB, just a clone using sysprep. Worth a shot and if it doesn't work I'll start a fresh install. Just curious at how effective sysprep will be. But my main concern is USB in Win 7 using Skylake.

If you're using a USB mouse and/or keyboard, it'll mean you need to enable the "Windows 7 installation" option in the UEFI regardless of whether you're installing from a DVD or a USB stick, and keep it enabled until you've installed all the appropriate drivers from within the new Windows installation.

 

[VirtualLarry]

It's not hard to set up, if the BIOS has a "PS/2 port emulation" setting for the USB. That will at least allow for keyboard + mouse (but not scrollwheel) to work in the Windows installer.

But remember, you cannot use USB, until you get the xHCI driver installed. Which means, also, that you cannot put the xHCI driver on a USB stick and plug it in to install it.

I've heard that if you install Win7 from a SATA DVD-RW/ROM, then after you finish installing it, you insert the mobo's CD/DVD, and install the xHCI driver that way, it will work.

The method that I've personally used, is to make up a UEFI-bootable Linux Mint 17.3 USB stick using Rufus, and then boot off of it (after installing Win7 64-bit off of DVD), and then Linux has no problems with xHCI, so USB is usable in Linux, along with the ethernet, so connect to the internet via ethernet, and then download the drivers for Win7 off of your mobo mfg's site, directly to your HDD/SSD that you installed Win7 to, using Linux to write to that drive. When finished downloading, shut down Linux and re-boot into Windows. When in Windows, just double-click and install the driver file(s).

Once the chipset and xHCI drivers are installed, then you can use USB sticks normally.

 

[Dahak]

Or just integrate the xHCI drivers into the boot.wim and install.wim files and it will allow usb to work as well. I have done this for the previous usb3 drivers in windows 7 but not for skylake based drivers.

 

[John Connor]

So I'm thinking that I could just put the drivers on the second HDD, connect my old PS/2 mouse and do it that way.