Z4 G5 with internal Wi-Fi antenna - Where to put the Intel AX210 card?

[Z440Roger]

I have a Z4 G5 workstation and it came with an external Wi-Fi antena placed on the back of the chassi. In the Qiuck Specs document i can find "Intel® AX210 Wi-Fi 6 non-vPro +Bluetooth® 5.2 wireless card with Internal Antenna WLAN" but it seems that for some reason it´s not an Optional Kit and therefore it has no part number. (So why is it even there?)

I have looked at the motherboard hoping to find a place to install a Intel® AX210 Wi-Fi 6 card directly on the motherboard but cannot find where to install it. It should be there since the antenna with it´s two internal cables are there, ready to be put on the Intel® AX210 Wi-Fi 6 card.

Am i missing something? Is there a solution?

Today i have the HP Wi-Fi Pci-e card installed but would like to free up one Pci-e slot. The card is the 340L7AA.

Any hope?

[DGroves]

the HP z4 G5 wifi option does not use a pci-e or M.2 style card

your system uses a small module called "flexio" these modules come in various interfaces serial/video/usb/wifi and so on

also note the flexio modules currently has three different revisions that are not interchangeable

i believe the Z4 G5 uses the v2 flexio modules and as of this post they appear not to offer a wifi flexio module as a separate item meaning it's only available at the time you purchase the system

https://h20195.www2.hp.com/v2/getpdf.aspx/c05105339.pdf

your flexio module connector  is on the opposite side of the atx power connector along the edge of the motherboard

bottom line use a pci-e m.2 addin pci-e card along with a laptop style ax210 wifi module if you already have the antenna cables

or just buy one that has antennas (for people who don't already have a card/antenna  like this poser has)

https://www.amazon.com/WiFi-6E-PCIe-WiFi-Card-for-PC/dp/B0B4VH4G1C/ref=sr_1_8?crid=9VNPB810S52I&dib=...

lsat thes wifi pci-e cards require a internal 9 pin usb header for the cards bluetooth part to work

[SDH]

Z440Roger, 

Good to hear from you again.

Read my response in the recent post HERE  and my links in that response take you to what you want. Not so sure about DGroves' answer... I'll go get the QuickSpecs for that Z4 G5 but my recollection is that there is no such port built into it.

I used the same PCIe card kit option part number in that QuickSpecs and "rolled my own" in creating exactly the PCIe card based WiFi/Bluetooth kit that has the same official HP option part number for my Z4 G4 here... same option part number is in both the Z4 G4 and Z4 G5 QuickSpecs. That does not free up a PCIe slot for you, however.

[SDH]

Roger,

DGroves is right that there is a FlexIO module receiver build-to-order option mentioned, but all the Z4 G5 workstations I've seen don't have that. Look in the Z4 G5 QuickSpecs v35 released late June this year attached below... see the rear-view picture of the workstation near the beginning. There is a rear metal knockout shown up on the left for adding in a FlexIO module receiver, and there also is a listing for the PCIe card kit that includes the Intel WiFi/Bluetooth AX210 insert you mentioned. If your metal knockout is still present then you don't have the FlexIO module receiver or the actual WiFi/BT insert module that DGroves speaks of. If someone wants to roll their own PCIe card kit, I provided what they need in my older post's links above. I'm guessing you could go PCIe card or FlexIO equally well if you had the FlexIO receiver in place. I have no experience with that FlexIO approach in these workstations and actually think it may not exist yet or exists only if you ordered it ahead of time.

EDIT: The multiple flex IO modules from HP are listed on page 6 of the PDF. The last one in that listing is a WiFi/BT option. Note it says internal antenna. In my experience internal antennas has always indicated a build to order option (=CTO, configure to order), from the factory. The PCIe card kit, however, can be customer-added later which is what I did with my Z4 G4. That kit works great here, by the way, and it only needs to use a PCIe3 x1 shortest slot.

One possibility for what you've reported is that for some or all Z4 G5 workstations HP puts in the two internal antennas (WiFi and BT) inside the case like with many laptops but does not put in the FlexIO receiver or the FlexIO wireless module.

In some other motherboards the traces for both WiFi and Bluetooth are already present and lead to a short dedicated PCIe M.2 socket which supports both BT and WiFi with no added cables needed (other than the 2 antenna leads). I have not seen that listed for any of the HP workstations, however. For the PCIe card kit approach you have to add on a jumper cable from the HP PCIe card over to a USB2 header on the motherboard to get the BT part to work. You only need to use one channel of a two channel 2x5 9-pin motherboard USB2 header to use Bluetooth, and some HP workstations even have a 1x5 4-pin USB2 header available for that purpose. BT needs only that lower bandwidth to work fine.

The PCIe card "kit" I refer to can be found by searching the PDF for 340L7AA.

[SDH]

Z440Roger, AKA Z4G5Roger,

The latest QuickSpecs for the Z6 G5 A version are from 8/5/25, v22, and include reference to a Flex Port add on WiFi/BT module:

"MediaTek RZ616 Wi-Fi 6 + Bluetooth® 5.3 wireless card Flex Port NIC with Internal Antenna" for the Flex Port receiver device that goes into the same rear metal knockout space and is again a build-to-order option including internal antennas.  There is no mention of an Intel AX210 equivalent insert module for that receiver, but our same 340L7AA PCIe card kit using that is again listed.

See below:

EDIT:   I'm sure you know this stuff, but for others... The little MediaTek WiFi/BT module that goes into the FlexIO device that inserts into the FlexIO-receiver on the metal backplane of a Z6 G5 A probably could go into your Z4 G5 also (if you had the receiver). The Intel little AX210 WiFi/BT module looks identical in form factor but who knows the traces...  AMD and MediaTek worked together to create that WiFi/BT module. The "A" in Z6 G5 A stands for AMD, and HP worked with AMD on the engineering of that workstation. Maybe Intel chose not to work with HP on creating a planned FlexIO AX210 insert?

The motherboard diagram for the Z4 G5 shows some interesting ports including the one for the FlexIO-receiver that DGroves mentioned, #12 below:

MB ports worth knowing about...

[DGroves]

"SDH" all of the HP Z4 G5 motherboards have the "flexio" connector, and i suspect you are correct that HP does install the wifi/BT antenna leads on all production models regardless of whether or not wifi is actually specced for that particular configuration 

the HP online configurator for this model system does indeed state a intel AX210 wifi option which the parts surfer website does not currently list?

[Z440Roger]

@SDH @DGroves 

Thank you for your great answers! 🙂

In the end i opted for the quick&easy solution and bought a MSI BE6500 Wifi7 USB adapter. Plug in > install drivers > log in and that´s all i needed to do. I will look into the other option later, or maybe wait till i buy a new workstation. But for now, the 340L7AA Pci-e card is at last removed.

My Z4 G5 is an "off shelf " workstation (523U4EA#UUW) and not a BTO one. The BTO ones are much pricier even if they have the exact same spec as an off shelf workstation, so maybe not an BTO in the end after all next time...

I hope that HP include this card in all WS´s in the future. I mean, the off shelf computers do have antennas but do not have an easy convinient solution to buy/add a working card to use the antenna. Laptops from all brands have a built in wifi card even in low end ones since many years.

[DGroves]

laptops by their nature are portable devices with limited  and/or non std expandability, so wifi is not a unusual feature as a standard included item

desktop workstations are not portable have standardised expandability feature sets  and are usually hardwired for network access as such wifi is usually a option although including wifi is becoming a much more common standard feature

[SDH]

Z440Roger,

Back to your desire for added PCIe slot(s)... FYI the OCuLink port on the motherboard in your Z4 G5 (also present in my Z4 G4) provides us with an added option. Those are present to interface with the optional Premium Front IO/USB Type-C 20 Gbps signaling rate with USB Power Delivery 3.0 interface and yet most of us don't order that, leaving the motherboard's OCuLink port open for use.

That is a portal for adding access straight into the PCIe bus, and Icy Dock makes a nice NVMe M.2-to-U.2 adapter that then can be used via an adapter cable plugged into the OCuLink port as a method to add another "PCIe slot", kind of. Take a look at that Icy Dock device plus the excellent YouTube video on using that at the links below:

https://youtu.be/6gKOi56npgQ

MB705M2P-B_M.2 NVMe SSD PCIe 4.0 to 2.5" U.2 SSD Converter/Mounting Adapter

Icy Dock even makes a receiver (the MB601VK-B) for this M.2 to U.2 adapter so you could have several of the NVMe M.2 to U.2 adapters handy for different purposes. A NVMe U.2 2.5" form factor SSD could also be plugged into that receiver (LINK). Plus, there also is the HP FANS approach (Front Accessible NVMe Storage) which your Z4 G5 motherboard has a specific port for. See the FANS technical white paper attached below. Finally bifurcation turned on for a HP x8 PCIe socket can provide full speed performance for two M.2 drives via a Z Turbo Drive Dual Pro and "quadrification" turned on for a x16 socket can do the same for four M.2 drives via a ZTD Quad Pro.

[DGroves]

to "SDH" your comment on the flexio wifi modules "A" suffix meaning AMD  based systems is correct i suspect.

i suspect as this "A" suffix wifi module most likely does not have/support the vPro feature that some of the Intel based cpu's do have and support but i could be wrong so if anyone does kno please correct my guess