Success!!, Applying widows updates first makes a huge difference!!
I installed only chipset, management engine and vga drivers [in that order], then used a pci wifi card to connect to the net and installed all windows updates.
After that, the x-fi driver and all others installed with no distress to the OS or the operator!!
The wifi card I used was a TP Link for which windows 7 already had a driver.
This discovery was actually made on the Intel dx79sr board which suffers the exact same issue, but with their usb3, lan and wifi drivers which before applying win updates first, would take several minutes each to install and trashed the boot time to around 2 minutes!!