Memory frequency on HP Z420 workstation other than PC3-12800 (eg: PC3-14900, please confirm.

[512kwizard]

Hi first time here, I have a question that is not satisfied with the internet and this support forum had some comments but not relevant to what I'm asking very specificially:

For example take an ivy bridge Xeon socket 2011 E5-1620 v2 which is rated DDR3-1866 ECC but the overview says DDR3-1600 for HP Z420 regardless but I knew white paper is not written in stone.

Has anyone have used DDR3-1866 (PC3-14900) with no problem in said workstation model and this processor?  Keep in mind these processors has direct connection with memory slots.

I have also Z220 workstation with great satisfaction due to plenty of drive bays, 7 expansion cards slots vs my old Dell 780 with paltry HD bays and expansion slots.  Even considered Dell T3510 but also has severe few drive bays only 2x 3.5" and 1x 5.25" bays vs Z420's.  Hence this reason for question on Z420's PC3-14900 speed memory support.  T3510 does but I'm not interested in Dell.

Cheers, 512kwizard

[banhien]

Hi,

From the following link, it supports ECC unbuffered DDR3 1600 MHz RAM

    http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/pscmisc/vac/us/product_pdfs/Z420_datasheet-highres.pdf

it MAY support higher clock speed RAM BUT it will downgrade to 1600MHz no matter what.

Regards.

[MtothaJ · Accepted solution]

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@512kwizard wrote:

Hi first time here, I have a question that is not satisfied with the internet and this support forum had some comments but not relevant to what I'm asking very specificially:

For example take an ivy bridge Xeon socket 2011 E5-1620 v2 which is rated DDR3-1866 ECC but the overview says DDR3-1600 for HP Z420 regardless but I knew white paper is not written in stone.

Has anyone have used DDR3-1866 (PC3-14900) with no problem in said workstation model and this processor?  Keep in mind these processors has direct connection with memory slots.

I have also Z220 workstation with great satisfaction due to plenty of drive bays, 7 expansion cards slots vs my old Dell 780 with paltry HD bays and expansion slots.  Even considered Dell T3510 but also has severe few drive bays only 2x 3.5" and 1x 5.25" bays vs Z420's.  Hence this reason for question on Z420's PC3-14900 speed memory support.  T3510 does but I'm not interested in Dell.

Cheers, 512kwizard

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1866mhz will work with the higher end Ivy Bridge v2 Xeon and run at 1866mhz. If 1866mhz is used with a Sandy Bridge v1 Xeon it will run at 1600mhz due to the memory controller in the CPU - tried and tested.

HP did not label their quickspec documents, but if you look at the one for Z420 which lists v2 Xeons

http://www8.hp.com/h20195/v2/GetPDF.aspx/c04111468.pdf

you will see it shows 1866mhz for supporting v2 CPU's (incl 1620 v2) and that is the memory the machines came with.

[512kwizard]

Thank you for replies. 🙂

The PDF does not mention any other processors supported.  For example what about E5-2667 v2?  I had a funny experience with Z220 when trying to use i5-2550s and it was run at 2.7Ghz only (default frequency) but functional, will I have funny bone with Z420 trying to use E5-2667 v2 other than "offical" list of processors in this pdf paper?

Cheers, 512kwizard

[MtothaJ]

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@512kwizard wrote:

Thank you for replies. 🙂

The PDF does not mention any other processors supported.  For example what about E5-2667 v2?  I had a funny experience with Z220 when trying to use i5-2550s and it was run at 2.7Ghz only (default frequency) but functional, will I have funny bone with Z420 trying to use E5-2667 v2 other than "offical" list of processors in this pdf paper?

Cheers, 512kwizard

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I think that this paper is more a product offer than a official compatibility list.  If you look at the last post in this thread:   https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Business-PCs-Workstations-and-Point-of-Sale-Systems/How-does-your-HP-w...

you will see a user reporting running E5-2667 v2 in the Z620. Z420 and Z620 have the same bios files and microcodes - bascially my reading is that if you have a 2013 bootblock date machine you should be able to run all Sandybridge v1 and Ivy bridge v2 Xeon E5 CPU's.

That said, documentation on the HP side is pretty vauge - it doesnt even distinguish the bootblock date matter i.e that there are two versions of the Zx20 with only one being able to run the v2 CPU's. I think the official line is that these machines were sold as prebuilds and not meant to be upgraded.

@Coming back on the memory side, just to note that since there are no memory voltage / timing adjustments in the bios you will only be able to run whatever the memory runs at stock 1.5V settings. So  using higher voltage / higher speed ddr3 e.g. 2133 or 2400mhz running @ 1.65V is not possible=, since by default it will run probably at c.a. 1300mhz on stock voltage.