Crisis Recovery Jumper Z620 Z420 Z820 Revealed

[Rtorres]

Hi, did you happen to find out how to solve the issue. I have the same exact syntomphs on my HP Z820 -NO POST OR BOOT + BLACKSCREEN + FANS AT FULL SPEED-. All I did was upgrading from two E5-2630v2 to two E5-2696v2 and the issue came up. I have 2 of these workstations one has a 2011 boot block date, but this one has a 2013 boot block date, It was already running v2 processors so I guess it's not a compatibility issue.

Then I tried to go back to running the same old 2 E5-2630v2 and the issue remains. Got all components out and tried 1 single CPU on socket 0 (E5-2620v2) with 1 stick of 8 gbs of ram on DIMM 1 and I got prevideo memory error (5 beeps + 2 segs pause-, then tested 1 single cpu + 16 gbs of ram -DIMMS 1 + 8- and still got 5 beeps... all memories are good and seated correctly, -tested them with my other HP Z820- ). Then I installed back the 2 cpus with memories on all black dimms and got rid of pre memory error but went back to the starting point.

I've tried the "Crisis Jumper Method" But the Workstation keeps beeping 8 times per second and 2 segs quiet, the lights of the USB thumb drive keeps on during beeping, then when beeping stops it flashes quickly and then the lights shutdows and repeats all the beep coding again.

(I have tested 3 thumb drives all with 512 mbs partitions and FAT32 formating with J63_0395.bin on root directory of the thumb drive)

 If anyone has a suggestion I'm all ears. Thanks 

[snowdej]

Hi

I feel your pain - what problem

I do recall mine needing lots of attempts

have you done all the bios battery pulls and stuff, there is a password reset jumper too

On the front of my z820 there are usb2 and usb 3  ports.  have you tried both

also I would disconnect all other drives

Finally I would try a cd burned from another pc

Was v3.95 what was already on the pc?

I remember it taking lost of attempts over a couple of hours

Good luck

[Eddyzwo]

Sounds wired....

did you read about that pos error with nvidia graphic cards?

The biosupdate is unable to finish with nvidia card,

solution is to replace with simple gc to finish the bios update.

good luck

[SDH]

HP released an advisory for the ZX40 workstations that goes over their advised method of crisis recovery.  It includes directions that apply also to earlier workstations, and is currently available at:

 https://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c05163478

There is more to this whole issue than meets the eye, and the best advice is to read all the resources carefully to see if there are any tips you have missed.  And, also accept that at a point you may realize that there is no saving the motherboard and that it is time to give up and learn how to install a new/used one.  I just ordered a used v2 one for a nice Z420 build that somehow I zapped recently.  Rare, but it happens, and I think this was a static electricity event.  Over 10 years I've now blown BIOS on one motherboard via not upgrading BIOS from within BIOS (saved that one).  This second one appears lost forever by bad static luck.

[Libre]

Hi RTorres!

(You prompted me to write here again and to thank SnowDej for all the help he gave me! Thank you man 🙂 )

DONT GIVE UP!

Why? Because the actual solution I found was to put a different CPU in my board. See another poster SambalBij with similar experiences

I bought another machine to swap the boards over (after investigating getting the ROM chip replaced, which is possible but in my case was more expensive). Just as an experiment I tried sticking the CPU form the donor machine in my dead one before ripping out the board, it was a lower spec but same gen (1605)

It did not load the rom  from the usb

Fans came up and went down, and it remained stable, no beeps, still black screen.

I restarted without the USB stick and with a GPU and it booted like it always had before i trashed it

*** I put the original CPU back in (1650) and it ran perfectly***

DO BE METHODICAL!

There are so many variables here even if you do try a different CPU

If you can verify everything you're using to test is working first (RAM, CPU, GPU, USB disk etc)

I would be looking for absolute minimum attached to start with

1 stick of ram, no hard disks or cd drives etc

nothing in the expansion slots except a GPU (again an older GPU that can BIOS boot might be useful as opposed to UEFI GPU)

If you're getting beep codes resolve those first

I would try the USB flash last, as in your case you just wanted to upgrade processors

I dont know why this works, but I am sure I am not the only one. Something on the board is hanging the machine before it even gets to boot the USB flash disk

I did not even try the USB again as i was happy to have it back but I bet it would work now. I do know my bootable USBs and I did even try making a bootable CD ROM

I've been using the machine ever since - no damage was done

Good luck!

BTW HP did offer to sell me a new board when I opened a call with them, I am so glad i didnt!

[Rtorres]

/*UPDATE*/
Hey guys thanks for all your suggestions, so far I still haven't been able to bring back from the dead the workstation I've tried this to try to make the crisis jumper thing work without any luck:

1. Removed all optical drives, and hard drives also.... nothing.
2. Installed and old quadro 600... nothing.
3. Installed  a really old XFX Radeon HD 4350 ddr2... nothing
4. Burn bios 3.95 into a cd... nothing (get 8 beeps and lights of the optical drive and hardrive stast to flash but it's all it does, nothing foward from there, it just keeps beeping).
5. Tried 3 more usb thumb drves... nothing.

/*ADDITIONAL INFO*/
- Bad workstation has 3.91 bios on it, I found some pictures I had with the bios settings.
- Tested all ram on the other HP Z820 i own and the memory passed OK the system memory test.
- Tested PSU by swapping them between both of them and it all works good.

I'm trying to find a mobo that support the processors so I can do a test on them because my other HP Z820 has a boot block date od 2011 wich makes it incompatible with V2 processors. :(. Getting really frustated here.

I live in México, so customer support is a no no for me, HP does not appear to have support for this equipments in my country, the people answering the phone doen't have a clue what I'm talking of and the equipment lost warranty on 2018. So you guys are pretty much all support I have. 

[Libre]

RTorres!

See my previous post. Can you get hold of an old low spec compatible CPU? (only one is needed)

What CPUs do you have in your other 820? Did you try one?

Your problem sounds very similar to mine. I solved it by booting with a different CPU from a spare machine - it reset and worked fine. I then put the original CPU back in and it ran perfectly

Libre

[Rtorres]

Hey man thanks for your response. I took the day off to try different things but unfortunately for me nothing worked. I tried 4 different Xeons really methodical and nothing, here's what I did today:

//TESTING SPECS
1. Power it with One Xeon E5-2696v2 + 8 gb ram dimm1 = 5 beeps (memory error)
2.  Power it with One Xeon E5-2696v2 + 16 gb ram dimm 1 + 8 = 5 beeps again
- Follow this until I had all dimms of CPU 0 full always seating first black dimms = 5 beeps

// At this point im guessing is a mobo issue because all the ram was tested on my other HP Z820

3. Power it with Two Xeon E5-2696v2 + 64 gbs ram on all black dimms = 5 beeps yet again
4. Power it with Two Xeon E5-2696v2 + 128 gbs ram all dimms seated =  NO MEMORY ERROR BUT... Fans full speed and no bios recovery after switching the jumper.

// Then I follow this exact same tests using other CPU's I have in the exact same order (1 dimm of ram, then 2, then all on CPU 0 then 2 CPU's). Tested with:
- Xeon E5-2630v2 
- Xeon E5-2620v2

// Then I said to my self... perhaps it's a Ivy bridge issue, lets tear apart the other Z820 wich has E5-2620v1. And got the exact same results. 5 beeps on single CPU config and no beeps but fans at full speed when using 2 CPU's. In every scenario Crisis Jumper was useless.

// So i'm pretty much out of ideas. I guess I better sell it by parts or else buy a new MOBO, but at this point I don't have any confidence of success anymore.  All I did was upgrading my freaking CPU's.... could it be the mobo died while doing it? I have no static on my office, unplugged and purged power always before removing components, have done this a million times. Sigh*... 😞  need a beer.

[DGroves]

your memory error is just that a memory error

what type of ram are you using?  all ram must be the same type either ECC or unbuffered (non ECC)

do the ram specs match per memory bank? you can not mix 1 rank and 2 rank (or 4 rank)  modules all modules must be the same rank in a memory bank (check mem labels and note rank number)

are you installing the ram in the correct slots? see the attached link for the load order

are you installing the memory in the correct size order? IE- 2gb rams first then 4gb modules and remember not to mix sizes within a bank IE- bank one using 2 and 4 gb modules will not work, all modules in a bank must be the same size

http://h20331.www2.hp.com/hpsub/downloads/z620_memory_configurations.pdf

[SDH]

Good advice from DGroves, again.  You really do deserve a breakthrough.

Note that the linked 2012 document is for the version 1 Z620 workstations/processors.  The version 2 Z620 (and Z420 v2/Z820 v2) workstations/processors can use the 1866 MHz rated memory.  In our experience the Z420 v2 can use all the same memory as the Z620 v2.  This is different from the Z400 v2 vs the Z600 v2.