Illeagal hardware/software manipulation: a sign of things to come?

[Bikerdude]

I was going to post this in the CPU/GPU thread, but its serious enough that I didn't want it to get buried in a thread -

 

And on the subject of upgrades, a mate of mine ran into a very serious case of illegal market manipulation in the form of a Kabylake based laptop -

• He bought an Acer Aspire F15 F5-537G that was marked/stickered as having a Skylake 6th gen CPU, but actually came with a Kabylake 7th gen CPU. Oooh free upgrade I hear you say - you would think...
• First issue we ran into was getting Linux/Windows installed and booting -
  • The first h/w config used an NVMe m.2 SSD, we disabled secure boot - we installed Win8.1 and then Linux Mint, then Win8.1 would no longer boot when selected from the Linux bootloader.
  • We then trying the same config as above with Win10, but we found that Win10 kept Re-Enabling Secureboot, which then stopped Linux from loading. Evening disabling and trying to install Win10 in legacy mode failed - (1st instance of ILLEGAL/UNNECESSARY INTERFERENCE)
  • I then tried Win8.1/Mint but with an AHCI based m.2 drive, SB disabled and et voila, both OS would boot.
  • My mate then put the NVMe back in and eventually managed to update the bootloader and get Win8.1 to boot - hurrah!
• Once we had Win8.1/Mint running, my mate got all the drivers for linux installed (gfx, sound, nic etc) then its was my turn to get Windows 8.1 sorted.
• Because we had a Kabylake instead of Skylake CPU, the GPU on-board(HD-620) no longer had drivers for any version of windows below Win 10 when you look on Acer's support page. I was able to find windows 8.1 driver for the HD 620 on Intel support page for that GPU, but even with my 22yrs of computer knowledge I was not able to get that driver to install. I kept getting the same Intel error about not having a compatible system blah blah (2nd instance of ILLEGAL/UNNECESSARY INTERFERENCE)
• The Acer laptop had 2 GPU's, Intel and nVidia. but even disabling the Intel GPU so Windows would only use the nVidia still resulted in a Windows 8.1 installation that was stuck in display software rendering mode. And the bios in the Acer was soooo sh*t and restrictive in its lack of options, because there was no option to disable the Intel GPU from the bios.

Moral of the story? as it stands (and I hope this the case for all) any laptop with a Kabylake CPU with on-board GPU will NOT support any version of windows below Win10. This has class action suite written all over it, because it's a deliberate and willful manipulation of end-user software/hardware by Intel/Micro$oft to restrict end-user choice.

[Oldjim]

Already known http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/windows-7-wont-work-intels-current-next-gen-cpus/

 

 

If you’ve got a current generation Intel Skylake processor, they’re going to stop issuing security updates for these older supported versions of Windows in about eighteen months. Furthermore, Microsoft is refusing to support anything less than Windows 10 on Intel’s upcoming Kaby Lake processors, period.

[lowenz]

 

Because we had a Kabylake instead of Skylake CPU, the GPU on-board(HD-620) no longer had drivers for any version of windows below Win 10 when you look on Acer's support page. I was able to find windows 8.1 driver for the HD 620 on Intel support page for that GPU, but even with my 22yrs of computer knowledge I was not able to get that driver to install. I kept getting the same Intel error about not having a compatible system blah blah (2nd instance of ILLEGAL/UNNECESSARY INTERFERENCE)

But you can do the opposite Windows 10 and Skylake (using a Kabylake drivers package)

 

*Take di IDs of Skylake iGPU SKUs from the Skylake inf. catalogue:

 

;SKL HW

%iSKLULTGT1% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1906;

%iSKLULTGT2% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1916;

%iSKLULXGT2% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_191E;

%iSKLDTGT2% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1912;

%iSKLULTGT2f% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1921;

%iSKLULTGT3e% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1926;

%iSKLULTGT3% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1923;

%iSKLULTGT328W% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1927;

%iSKLDTGT1% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1902;

%iSKLHaloGT1% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_190B;

%iSKLHaloGT4% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_193B;

%iSKLHaloGT3fe% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_192B;

%iSKLHaloGT2% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_191B;

%iSKLSRVGT3e% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_192D;

%iSKLSRVGT4% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_193A;

%iSKLWSGT2% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_191D;

%iSKLWSGT4% = iSKLD_w10, PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_193D;

*Add those IDs to the Kabylake drivers catalogue in the relative OS sections ( "Windows Threshold Install - DT + Mobile" and "Windows Redstone Install - DT Only Using Driver Store" )

 

*Reboot Win10 disabling the signature verification

 

*Install the drivers package

 

 

Similar procedure for Win 8.1, just search for Win 8.1 IDs and Win 8.1 section instead of Win 10 ones

Edited January 8, 2017 by lowenz

[lowenz]

Already known http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/windows-7-wont-work-intels-current-next-gen-cpus/

Yes, Kabylake HW won't work on Win 7 / 8 / 8.1

 

The relative section in driver catalogue is EMPTY

 

;=====================================================================

; Windows 7 Install - DT Only

;=====================================================================

[intelGfx.NTamd64.6.1]

;=====================================================================

; Windows 8 Install - DT Only

;=====================================================================

[intelGfx.NTamd64.6.2]

;=====================================================================

; Windows 8.1 Install - DT Only

;=====================================================================

[intelGfx.NTamd64.6.3]

Edited January 8, 2017 by lowenz