I have a Ryzen 5 system that I wanted to install Windows Server 2019 to start experimenting with. Unfortunately, Intel doesn’t offer Windows Server 2019 drivers for their I211 NIC. There’s quite a bit of info regarding it, but no easy solutions.
Installing Intel I211, I217V, I218V and I219V drivers on Windows Server 2016 with EUFI boot
That looked like way to much work for me. As laziness is the mother of invention, I tried an old and true trick.
I downloaded the I218 drivers and extracted them using 7zip.
Next, I went into Device Manager and right-clicked on the NIC and selected Properties.
Clicked the Driver tab, then Update Driver, then Browse my computer for driver software.
The next step is the key, click Let me pick from a list of available drivers on my computer.
Click Have Disk. I browsed to the extracted files:
%downloads%\PROWinx64\PRO1000\Winx64\NDIS65
I then picked one of the INFs shown, e1r65x64.inf and clicked Open.
This brought up a list of NICs, I picked the I218 and installed the driver.
Everything works, except my I211 is showing up as an I218.
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