Unable to boot Linux from a ZTD G2 on an HP Z840

[mderouss]

Hello. I'm attempting to install, and boot from, a version of Linux located on an NVMe drive plugged in to an HP Z Turbo drive, using an HP Z840 workstation. I believe it to be an HP Z Turbo Drive G2, and I've fitted a 1Tb Crucial NVMe drive ( PCIe 3.0 ).

I've jumped through loads of hoops, and read copious quantities of material about this problem including threads here. The upshot is that I do not *seem* to be doing anything that should cause a problem. However, a problem there is.

1. I've loaded the most recent BIOS for this machine, dated April 2024.
2. I've removed all other drives from the system except the dvd.
3. The drive is located in a recommended slot for the Z840 ( slot 1, 8 lanes ).
4. I've reset the BIOS to factory defaults.
5. I have then run a 'live' version of Linux from USB. Linux can see the NVMe disk, partition it, read it, and write to it.
6. I've then used that 'live' Linux to install Linux on the NVMe device. It creates a small GRUB partition, and a large root partition.
7. I've mounted the root partition in the live system, and checked that it actually contains what I expect. Didn't check the grub partition, didn't know how.

I *cannot* get the system created as above to boot from the NVMe device. No matter what I do ( and much BIOS twiddling has been done.... ), when I boot I get error '340' saying that there is no OS. Although I can get the device to show up in the boot device list for legacy mode, I cannot make it appear for UEFI mode.

When I put a SATA Windows SSD into the system ( i.e. not in the Z Drive ), I can successfully boot from it.

So my problem is not a hardware issue, things like bifurcation are not an issue, and it's nothing to do with versions of NVMe. The problem is the BIOS's apparent inability to find and/or run GRUB on this NVMe device.

Can anyone please :

1. Confirm that they have a Linux system booting from an HP ZTD G2 and NVMe disk ?

2. For brownie points, confirm they can boot a Z840 this way ?

3. Point out the obvious mistake ? 🙂

[mderouss · Accepted solution]

Ahhhh, shucks, as they say :(.

Turns out the problem was nothing to do with the ZTD or the Z840.

I was installing Xubuntu, my favourite Linux flavour. But as I said, I couldn't verify that the GRUB partition was correct.

So I tried installing Rocky ( a Red Hat variant ) instead, just so that I was trying something definitely different.

And it worked. Whatever Xubuntu, or perhaps any Ubuntu for all I know, is doing when it installs onto the ZTD is not producing a bootable system ( and I tried that install three times ).  Rocky is. That's disappointing, I don't really want to start using Rocky. I'll see if the Xubuntu folk have any wisdom they would like to share on the matter.

[SDH]

This is a bit of a long shot but worth trying given your preference to use the version that does not work.

HP's Z Turbo Drive (both the G1 and G2) were engineered with a unique feature... a capability to only work with workstations/computers that HP wanted them to work in. This was discovered later by an electrical engineer, google knows the story, and there is a specific transistor that is easy to remove that lets these excellent cards work in other workstations/computers. It just might be that feature is interfering with your chosen Linux but not with the other one:

To remove the Q1 transistor from the ZTD G1 or G2 you don't need to desolder. There are two lower thin attachments of Q1 to the ZTD G1/G2 card PCB. Only one is present at the upper Q1 edge. I used a scalpel/small Exacto blade holder to gently cut free that upper single one (they are tin-coated soft copper alloy contacts about 1/32" wide each). Once that is done you then fold up and down on the lower two and they'll quickly separate by metal fatigue from the PCB, removing Q1 cleanly. The Z Turbo Drive still works just as well in intended HP workstations but now can work in other ones.

A post from a guy who used the more difficult desolder technique is HERE .

A pic from one of my prior posts on my technique is below... note my short scoring on the PCB just beneath the single upper solder pad where I cut free the upper contact:

Takes about 10 seconds....

Why would HP do such a thing? These Z Turbo Drive cards have premium engineering, components, and build quality. They were a "loss leader" for HP to sell with their premium-cost NVMe M.2 drives at a high profit margin. Note that they have 3 significant sized capacitors on board for preserving data signal quality and integrity, have the jumpers to set unique device IDs when running more than one, and the G2 version has that big heatsink while still preserving single slot width. They still work great even in PCIe gen4 slots with gen4 M.2 drives. And, they're a recycling bargain on eBay.

[mderouss]

Hi, thanks for the suggestion - I had come across this trick in my browsing. It's fascinating, but I'm going to treat it very much as a last resort. Being as the device is clearly accessible, I think it's much more likely the problem lies with how the Ubuntu install is configuring the partitions / bootloader. In fact, it doesn't get as far as a bootloader. My current best theory is that Ubuntu is setting up the system as BIOS/GPT instead of UEFI/GPT, and UEFI/GPT is all that the system is willing to entertain for boot purposes. Anyway, some more poking and prodding to be done :).