Z420 passing bios without pressing F1

[K2adir]

Hello, 
I just got my Z420 motherboard and I have few questions and problems with it so far.

I'm using the motherboard in a different case with Xeon 2690 V1.

When I boot the computer, it goes through few checks and such and gives me errors like

"CPU Fan isn't found" (I'm using a heatsink)
"USB 3.0 not found"  things like that 

and it tells me to press F1 to continue the boot. 

Is there any way to skip this process? I want the system to boot no matter what.

The keyboard I use doesn't get recognized in bios, I got another cheap keyboard to just to press F1. 

So, If there is any way to skip that F1 step, I'll be happy... 

[SDH]

Here's a quote from another related post I just put up:

"Finally, a number of the earlier workstations such as the xw6400 and xw6600 had a BIOS option under startup options to allow boot to silently proceed through non-fatal F1 errors, but that is gone from the Z400/Z600 BIOS."

My recall is that the ZX20 generation of HP workstations also does not have that option.  These warnings were engineered in by HP to protect the hardware.  Does your heatsink not have a fan?  If yours does have a fan maybe it is a 3-wire?  You can buy used HP fans off eBay that can be screwed onto a non-hp heatsink that used a fan of the same size (92x92x25mm probably).  What kind of fan is in place now?  What type of heatsink?

The plug end on the HP heatsink fans is usually a white 5 hole plug with pins 1-4 being ground, 12VDC, RPM sense, PWM control, and then there is a ground jumper from pin 1 to pin 5.  The Z620 and the Z420 motherboards are almost identical if you look at them closely..... just a couple of things stripped off.

E5-2690 is a Sandy Bridge generation processor, V1 type, and is a hot one..... 135W.  It had two sSpec codes:

SR0L0 (the later one, which ideally you have)

SR0HA (the earlier one which you'd rather not buy if you can get the later version)

Then there is the 130 watt E5-2690 V2 Ivy Bridge processor with sSpec code SR1A5.

[K2adir]

I have a CoolerMaster Hyper 212 EVO which has a  Heatsink and a fan installed and I'm pretty happy with it.

I saw something like this on Ebay, it is called 

"5 pin to 4 pin Fan Connector Adapter Conversion Extension Cable For Dell top" 

5 pin female goes on to the motherboard. I know it says dell but, it is 5 pin and how different could it be from a dell system? I'll research that but please share your knowledge if you know anything about it. 

It has a 4 pin fan, I 

[SDH · Accepted solution]

Nope.... that won't work.

The search bar for this forum is pretty good.... I remembered my source of the 5-hole white fan plug ends was from Mouser.com, plugged in Mouser, and got you this archived post from the past,  HERE.

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Desktops-Archive-Read-Only/Aftermarket-CPU-HeatSink-for-Quad-Core/m-p/...

I noted that the Z420 and Z620 motherboards are almost exactly the same, and the heatsink/fan for the two appear identical.  You can see those on eBay, and there is the one for the main motherboard, and the other one for the mini-motherboard riser used on the Z620 to support a second processor.

Your Dell adapter is not what you need.... take a look at a number of the Z620 heatsinks and the Z420 heatsinks.... they have that 5-hole white motherboard plug end for the fan, and it has a jumper from pin 1 to 5.  That has always meant the motherboard will get the message that the heatsink is a Performance version.  I've never seen a non-Performance heatsink for these workstations.

I have messed with non-HP fans or switched in slower HP fans to HP heatsinks.... overall I've settled on using the HP heatsink/fan stock combo because the tuning by HP has been excellent.  HP takes a fast long lived PWM fan and adds in their motherboard fan speed firmware, and the end result is nice and quiet, and lasts a very long time.

Having said that, you can experiment.  Your heatsink looks great and has a 120mm PWM fan.  The HP white plug end with 5 holes can be bought from Mouser as noted above.  You can also get one from a junker HP fan you buy off eBay that has that plug included.  Be careful to label the wires if all black so you don't get the order messed up.  You can release the standard little metal ends on your fan from your plug, and carefully put them back in to the 5-hole HP plug.  You'll need to make the jumper or salvage it from the throw-away you might buy from eBay.  You get about one shot at keeping each metal end intact, so be careful and gentle.

This is pretty mechanical, but delicate work.  There is nothing special about the PWM control of the HP fan versus yours.... it is the plug and the proper wiring you need to get correct.  Then no more F1 errors.

With Noctua fans I found they were slow to start with, and then after doing this type of conversion they had the HP motherboard's PWM control added in, and thus they went from slow/quiet to too slow.  But, your fan might work out just fine using this method.

[K2adir]

Thanks a lot, I guess I need to do some modifying to get everything to work properly