I have acquired an old Surface Pro 2 (Windows 8), and would like to run Blender on it if I ever want to use the touchscreen for drawing, sculpting, etc. The Surface Pro 2 should, in theory, run Blender, and it has run (post 2.8) Blender before, but since I have got it as my own (in the process I did a full reset), various versions after 2.8 have not run for a few different reasons.
Initially I tried installing Blender 3.2.1 (from an msi file), but on attempting to open it, it said that the program couldn't start because api-ms-win-crt-heap-l1-0-0.dll was missing, and recommended that I re-install the program. I did this a few times, with no luck. I then followed both methods in this video, Method 1: adding the files manually, Method 2: installing Visual C++ Redistributable. Once the files were added manually, Blender gave a different message [reminder to self to add what it was later]. Visual C++ Red. failed to install. I then tried installing other Blender versions:
- Blender 2.79b worked fine.
- Blender 2.8 crashed upon startup.
- Blender 2.81 warned about the graphics card driver perhaps not being up to date, but when I pressed "continue anyway", it crashed like 2.8 did.
- Blender 2.91 was identical to 2.81
I would really appreciate any help anyone could offer. Thanks