HP Z440 and Windows 10 BSOD strangeness

[wny2016]

Have a Z440 that we got last year as a backup machine, need to put into operation. This workstation is running a pair of brnad new (installed by me) SAS drives in RAID1 off of a LSI SAS 2308 controller, no other drives right now.

Installed Windows 10 to the RAID drives, no issues. On powerup, the machine installs the SAS BIOS, spends some time running through the regular Boot Agent (looking for SATA boot drive, I assume...), then then launches into Windows 10. But frequently, after the bootup process has finished, I get a BSOD, with error reported as Stop code: PAGE FAULT IN NONPAGED AREA, What failed: TeeDriverW8x64.sys - which AFAIK is the Intel Management Engine driver. I went in and updated this driver, but it makes no difference.

After the BSOD runs its course, Windows launches normally and runs fine.

It's very annoying to have to sit there and wait until the BSOD processes are done. Does anyone know what might be wrong here? Latest build of Win 10, etc etc etc.

[DGroves]

you should be using Intel Management Engine Software 11.7.0.1068 Rev.A from the HP site for the z440, uninstall the current version and reinstall if that does not work you can try a clean install. it's possible a wrong version was installed somehow

This package contains Intel Management Engine Software version 11.7.0.1068 for Microsoft Windows operating systems. Intel Management Engine Software version 11.7.0.1068 has support for HP Workstations with Intel Management Engine firmware 9.x and 11.x.

also, z440's came with ver 9 a of the mgmt firmware, check which version you have installed and if v9 you may have to update the firmware

https://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp90001-90500/sp90102.exe

This package provides an update to the Intel Management Engine (9.1) Firmware and utilities for HP Z1 G2, Z228, Z230, Z440, Z640, and Z840 Workstations.

[BambiBoomZ]

WNy2016,

This thread re: a similar situation, titled, "No Windows 10 drivers for LSI SAS2308 controller?"

on this forum may be of assistance:

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Desktop-Hardware-and-Upgrade-Questions/No-Windows-10-drivers-for-LSI-S...

This looks extremely promising: possibly "the magic button". One of my computer mottoes is that sometimes, there's often a simple magic button, but it requires hours and hours of searching to find it,..

This Supermicro LSI 2308 SAS configuration guide also may be of assistance:

https://www.supermicro.com/manuals/other/LSI_HostRAID_2308.pdf

> but for a different reason; note the date of this guide: December 12, 2012.  As far a I know the last driver version was for W8.1 as is cited in the referenced thread above, and that post does  say the 8.1 driver "might" run on W10. However, the situation with the subject system maybe demonstrating that newer BIOS and controller designs can have serious problems.  Bulldozing through BSOD's on every startup = system "unhappiness."

I've noticed a number of times that W8.1 is the starting point for certain hardware drivers as in "8.1 or newer".  I recently bought a new PCIe2.0 to SATAIII adapter, but it did not run in the 2007 W7 system listed below. However, when I tried it in a 2011 W10 system, it self-installed and worked very well.

I have an LSI 2308 somewhere that I never used- purchased when I had a Dell Precision T5500, but, for the PCIe 2.0 to SATAIII adapter card for this 2007 system, I may try the 2308 in my project:

Dell Precision 390 (2007) (R9_T2): Xeon X3230 (4C@ 2.67GHz) / 8 GB DDR2-667 ECC / Quadro K2200 4GB / Samsung 850 EVO 250GB  + HGST 7K4000 1TB / Creative Audigy 2ZS S/C > Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit > HP 2711x 27"
[ Passmark PT9: Rating = 1964 / CPU = 3402 / 2D= 398 / 3D=3300 / Mem= 845 / Disk= 2691] [STM= 1021] 12.3.20

The  2308 may work in the P390 as it was designed so much nearer the period of the 390.

It may be possible to configure the 2308 for the z440, however of the 586, z440's tested on Passmark Performance Test, none are shown using one  and it seems to me there are only a few using RAID volumes.

For a system that recent, consider changing to a more recent controller design- especially one that was available as an option on the z440.  I've had excellent results on two z420's using the HP 9212 -4i  that may be attributable to the fact that it was specifically designed for the z420 and z620 which use extremely similar motherboards and the same BIOS.  Or, if it's a backup system not needing the absolutely highest real-time performance, consider configuring the RAID 1 on the onboard controller.

However, here's hoping that the 2017 solution in the linked thread will work. However, the newer  z440  BIOS and controller designs may  preclude it.

BambiboomZ

HP z620_2 (2017) (R7):  Xeon E5-1680 v2 (8C@ 4.3GHz) / z420 Liquid Cooling / 64GB (HP/Samsung 8X 8GB DDR3-1866 ECC registered) / Quadro P2000 5GB _ GTX 1070 Ti 8GB / HP Z Turbo Drive M.2 256GB AHCI + Samsung 970 EVO M.2 NVMe 500GB + HGST 7K6000 4TB + HP/HGST Enterprise 6TB / Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 sound interface + 2X Mackie MR824 / 825W PSU / Windows 7 Prof.’l 64-bit (HP OEM) > 2X Dell Ultrasharp U2715H (2560 X 1440)

[ Passmark Rating = 6280 / CPU rating = 17178 / 2D = 819 / 3D= 12629 / Mem = 3002 / Disk = 13751 / Single Thread Mark = 2368 [10.23.18]
[Cinebench: OpenGL= 134.68 fps / CPU= 1234 cb [10.27.18]

HP z420_3 (2015) (R11): Xeon E5-1650 v2 (6C@ 4.3GHz) / z420 Liquid cooling / 64GB (HP/Samsung 8X 8GB DDR3-1866 ECC registered) / NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6GB / HP/LSI 9212-4i HBA/RAID (=4X SATAIII) > Samsung 860 EVO 500GB + HGST 4TB / ASUS Essence STX + Logitech z2300 2.1 / 600W PSU > Windows 7 Professional 64-bit (HP OEM ) > Samsung 40" 4K

[Passmark System Rating: = 5644 / CPU = 15293 / 2D = 847 / 3D = 10953 / Mem = 2997 Disk = 4858 /Single Thread Mark = 2384 [6.27.19]

[wny2016]

Thanks. I had already tried updating this, but it did not help.

[wny2016]

Thanks for the insight. There is no issue with the LSI SAS controller and the Z440 - it worked right off the bat. I tend to use SAS controllers + drives for the system/OS in RAID1 for reliability, and regular SATA drives for data, also in RAID1.

It turned out that I was able to fix this problem by just flashing the BIOS, something I had initially tried via the HP Assistant tools, but then recalled that Windows 10 won't let you do that without a lot of major futzing around. I just went into the pre-boot HP setup and did it from there.

This system now boots into windows 10 without any errors. It does take an extra few seconds for it to run through the Boot Manager stuff where it looks for (I assume) a SATA boot drive, but then it just boots from the SAS array.