So after checking other issues I now manually installed openJDK JRE (openJDK17U-jre_x64_windows_hotspot_17.0.10_7.msi) and changed the knime.ini accordingly (-vm
C:/Program Files/Eclipse Adoptium/jre-17.0.10.7-hotspot/bin/server/jvm.dll) and it works.
More interestingly, Knime 5.2.2 now also works with the internal jre (change back to original knime.ini vm). However, I must not uninstall the Eclipse JRE. Perhaps the installation configures the path correctly (that should not be required)? I am guessing only, perhaps @wiswedel you have an idea since you fixed a similar issue before? Thank you!