How can I get sound working on Bootcamp + Windows 8.1? Windows 8.1 isn't playing back audio on my 13" mid-2012 Macbook Pro.  I only have a speaker with an x on my notifications bar.  When I click on it, I get the usual "detecting problems" garbage.  Unfortunately, every "solution" I've found seems to work for everyone else, but not for me.



Device Manager

Windows shows a High Definition Audio Controller listed under System.  Its properties state that it has a Code 10 - "This device cannot start", along with "The requested operation was unsuccessful."  This is the only notion of an audio device listed in Device Manager.

Most solutions I've found say drivers need to be reinstalled (downloaded from the internet or simpliy re-run from the Bootcamp support drivers) and I've currently tried the following:


Bootcamp setup.exe (No errors are reported, 5.0.5033 "installs" a variety of sound drivers)
Cirrus Audio (Both CirrusAudiox64.exe and a manual .inf installation)
Realtek (I've tried nearly every link I've found) 
Intel Graphics 4000 (apparently it does audio too)


Every executable runs and reports success, however, I don't see any sign of a change apart from the Realtek driver copying files somewhere in Program Files, and the Intel driver blanking the screen a few times.



Cirrus Audio

I've tried manually installing the Cirrus Audio driver by performing the following:


Select High Definition Audio Controller from Device Manager
Click on Driver -> Update Driver
Select "Browse my computer for driver "
Select "Let me pick from a list of device drivers"
Click "Have Disk..." and navigate to the .inf file


At this point windows complains that the driver does not support Windows x64, despite having "x64" written all over it.

"The folder you specified doesn't contain a compatible software driver for your device. If the folder contains a driver, make sure it is designed to work with Windows for x64-based systems."

If I skip #'s 4 and 5, and browse directly for the driver files, Windows reports that the Driver software is already up to date.

"Windows has determined the driver software for your device is up to date."

This makes me believe that Windows 8.1 might have an issue with certain drivers, deeming them unusable in some way.  It's possible that windows is denying the .exe installers' drivers, Realtek, and Cirrus behind the scenes, without letting them install anything.  Maybe they report success and silently fail?



Setup

It's worth mentioning that my Bootcamp setup isn't typical.  I've partitioned the hard drive and installed windows manually, alongside Arch Linux.  (I've triple booted this thing, and windows audio is the final hurdle.)  I'm also using the refind efi bootloader to boot the system.

For the windows boot option, I point refind to /EFI/Microsoft/bootmgfw.efi, without any options. I'm thinking that Bootcamp might do more than partition and install, and that I'm supposed to do more to inform windows about the macbook hardware at this stage.  Is this the case?  Did I miss something critical about Bootcamp?



If anyone can help me solve this, I will be eternally grateful.  Thanks.

P.S. I'm a linux user, so windows drivers aren't exactly my forte.  If I'm doing something totally wrong, please let me know.
Forget EFI and install using boot camp assistant.

After backing everything up, wiping my partitions, and installing Windows 8.1 using Bootcamp, everything works as normal.  The machine boots using bios mode, Cirrus Audio was properly installed after a single run of setup.exe from the Bootcamp support software, and the device is recognized properly as VEN_1013 DEV_4206 --Cirrus Audio CS4206B (AB 82).

It sucks, but it's worth it.  I plan on resizing windows' ntfs partition and booting linux beside it, but that's a problem for another day.