Updating to Windows 10 Version 2004/Conexant Drivers

@texgeekboy

Yours is a very good summary. I will note one other option- follow the instructions on page 3 to manually install the Lenovo Connexant driver, which is a newer version (8.66.89.50, which is greater than 8.66.89.00) that passes the Windows Update blocks.

(In my case, on an LG Laptop, it changed the name of the device from "Connexant HD Audio" to "Connexant SmartAudio HD" but it seems to work fine.)

If you want to ensure that you stick with the Lenovo driver and it doesn't get automatically replaced somehow, you can use the Group Policy Editor to put in a block. See this article for how to do that.

With the Lenovo SmartAudio HD driver (8.66.89.50), you can then update to Windows 10 20H2 using the Media Creation Tool, it will no longer block you.

At the time I'm writing this there are 22 pages to the thread.  That's pretty long to read.  I'll try to summarize, but this is my outlook.  Others probably have a different outlook;

1. I do not expect an update to the conexant driver software.  Another company (Synaptics) now owns that IP.  My career was in software development, but not of this type.  Still, when someone buys someone else's IP, the support for it can become non-existent.  IMHO, the only hope is that at some point, for some future Windows release, they will come up with a brand new driver.
2. Somewhere in this thread there is a post by someone that posted a formal request to MS to update Windows to handle the driver issue.  The poster has requested that his/her request be given a thumbs up by as many people as possible in order to let MS know that people want it done.  I discovered that in order to give it a thumbs up, you need to be a part of the 'Microsoft Insider' program.  I don't think joining it is actually a big deal.  I haven't seen where you get a bunch of emails from that program.
3. Some people have gone to great lengths to remove the offending conexant device driver so that the block on windows update is removed, thereby giving you the ability to install the 2004 and 20H2 updates.  In its place they installed the default MS driver for the audio.  Some of those attempts, IIRC, were unsuccessful and others took quite some effort to ensure that the old conexant driver didn't get reinstalled.  I didn't really follow those instructions, but many people have reported success.  You'll have to search the thread for the instructions.
4. I just brute forced the 2004 update.  I have a 5+ year old HP Envy laptop I love, so before I did that I did a full backup.  Actually, HP no longer supports the laptop either.  Anyway, after forcibly applying the update I did not have any problems.  From what I can tell, the conexant driver (10.0.19041.1 dated 12/6/2019) is still the same.  I am running Win10ProX64 with the 20H2 update.  A disclaimer is that I use it mainly for MS Office stuff, web surfing, and a Zoom meeting now and then.  I do not use it for gaming or even streaming videos, so YMMV.

Numbers 3 & 4 may be highly dependent on the hardware running Win10.

Good luck.

So what do people with computers with Conexant drivers do? Windows Update says update drivers but there are none acceptable, it also says Microsoft is working on a fix ? So what do we do? If there are compatible drivers for devices using Conexant Audio where are they, how do we get them and install or replace them (I have tried everything to no avail). When does MS expect a fix ? Are persons with Conexant audio drivers computers at end of life ? Does anybody care ?

It is a joke that they did not find a solution after 2 releases 2H1 and now 2H2 for the conexant driver issue.

will hope that Microsoft will extend the lifecycle for W10 1909 when they are not able to fix the  issue before may 2021.

Hi 

 download windows 10 20h2and make an iso file > then extract the iso > then access the installation folder then start the setup.exe > then accept keep files and apps then follow the process. If you don't have extract option download 7zipand install it. Leave a feedback

Good Luck