Well after all my issues with my 7700, I decided to install Vista on it for a laugh. After a bit of stuffing around, I have a perfectly working Vista install, with webcam, modem (!) etc all operational.

I thought I'd detail how I did it here, in order to aid anyone else that might be attempting this.

First thing to note, my motherboard is rev 6.1N. All my other specs are in my signature below.

Second thing to note - I could not boot from the Vista 32bit DVD and get it to install to an existing partition on my RAID0 set, regardless of what drivers I used. Windows kept telling me it couldn't verify a valid system partition.

Fortunately I still had Windows XP SP2 with all updates/drivers etc installed. My drive/partition configuration was as follows (have had this config since day 1):

C: - 20Gb (Windows XP) Primary Partition
D: - 72Gb (Games) Logical Drive inside an extended partition
E: - 20Gb (Storage) Logical Drive inside an extended partition

I transferred all files off E: to an external HDD, then fired up the Vista Ultimate installer from inside Windows XP (note, I did NOT do an upgrade, I ran the "clean install" option as I wanted to dual boot Vista and XP). Of course it complained about the RAID drivers being missing. I had previously downloaded the RAID drivers linked to by Hoshie here in another thread.

Raid drivers: RapidShare: 1-Click Webhosting

Now, when you go to load the RAID drivers (I put them on a USB stick), point it towards the XP folder, and install the Controller driver. Now, here's the important part... once the Controller driver is installed, Browse the same folder AGAIN and load the SCSI Panel driver (will get the exact name when I get home tonight and add screenshots as well.)

Once both these drivers are loaded, I attempted to install on the E: partition. It failed, so I deleted the e: partition, recreated and formatted it (all inside the Vista installer) and then tried again - success! Vista began to install.

On first reboot, it bounced off the DVD, then went looking for the setup files and flashed up a message along the lines of 'boot drive could not be found'. I panicked at this point as I thought I had trashed my XP install too.. didn't like the idea of setting everything up again.

However that wasn't the case.. I popped out the Vista DVD, rebooted, and away it went, back into setup. Setup then went through the rest of its motions, and 45 minutes or so later, Vista was up and running.

Now here's the interesting bit - I went straight into Device Manager expecting to see 39 modems like everyone else had... this was not the case. There were 5 devices without drivers:

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The Multimedia Audio Controller is my Audigy ZS 2 notebook, the High Def Audio the Realtek.

So first thing I did was downloaded and installed this driver from Realtek (note I have not touched the modem, it is still installed):

ftp://209.216.61.149/pc/audio/Vista_R182.zip

This installed, and I had sound straight away (without rebooting even!) I rebooted anyways (always good practice after installing a new driver), and it came back up with sound still active.

I then installed the Atheros driver from here:
http://rapidshare.com/files/67125225...v1.15.exe.html

That got wireless up and running just fine, and it's been very stable (no disconnects).

At this point, I also downloaded the latest driver from Creative for my Audigy 2 notebook. The Audigy 2 then came up fine and took over as primary audio device. I tested fallback by stopping the Audigy device, removing it, and Vista automatically switched back to the realtek - success all around!

Next, for video, I installed this driver, along with the modified .INF:

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/...howtopic=16311

Great driver, I'm getting nice FPS in Hellgate London with most settings at High.

Now for the kicker - Comodo Personal Firewall is imo one of the best out there, and they now have a version for Vista (I use it mostly because it prompts you to allow outgoing connections, so stops malicious programs/files from doing the same). However.. DON'T install it before running Windows Update, and updating to Microsoft Update etc... as all updates will fail.

Anyways, started up Windows Update, ran a check (after it upgraded to the latest version of Microsoft Update) and it found drivers for...

the Bisoncam and the Modem!! I caught a screenshot of the Bisoncam, but wasn't quick enough to catch the modem (as I really wasn't expecting it to find drivers for it.)

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I allowed these drivers to download and they installed just fine, and the webcam and modem are both fully operational. What's more is Device Manager is completely clean, no devices without drivers.. just the way I like it As per this screeny:

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I then installed my external monitor drivers, Logitech G15 and G5 drivers etc, and everything ran like a dream. Also installed the DX9 DLL's, by using the dx9 installer from my Hellgate London disc. There's also an installer available from here which contains all the DX9 DLL's, so you can get all your DX9 games working (since the 7700 doesn't do DX10 anyways ;/) :

http://www.threelights.de/index.php?..._dll_files.php

So anyways, I hope this helps someone in their quest to run Vista on the 7700, with RAID, and all devices installed and supported. Your mileage may vary, but I have a perfectly working install of Vista 32bit on my 7700, and it is dual booting well with my old XP installation (after some tinkering around with a program called Easy BCD)

PS I intend to update this post with screenies and non-rapidshare links to drivers, so we don't lose them. Will do so tonight when I get home from work.

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