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HP Recommended
Z400
Microsoft Windows 10 (64-bit)

Hello.  I am still lazy for it about BIOS things...
Sorry for my poor questions.
So I now have two Z400 machines.  I noticed older Z400 I had a few years ago, has BIOS 786G3 version 3.57.  I suppose previous owner did update this BIOS.

Now I had another Z400 machine.  That BIOS is 786G3 version 3.20.

 

Could you please give some ideas about BIOS for following my questions?
1.  Do I really need to update BIOS?  About hardwares I use inside, I input Quadro K2200, Xeon W3565 3.20GHz for version 3.20.  And Quadro K2000 or GTX660 Xeon W3520 2.67GHzfor version 3.57.  I am not sure these explanation is necessary for thinking of BIOS.
2.  Do you please suggest good updating method?  I searched some and I noticed a few ways.  Preparing USB flash or updating in Windows OS etc.   I am not certain what is a best way.  I do want to know how people do BIOS updating who own Z400 like me.

Thank you for your interest about this!


And

6 REPLIES 6
HP Recommended

start helping yourself by downloading the latest z400 bios and also the Readme file for it, the read said doc file that is included with the bios package and also available as a seperate download from the HP z400 driver page

 

for updating bios under win 10, use either the bios update option, or the DOS update method

 

do not use the windows 10 update option if using the win 10 OS, it can malfunction under this os and kill the motherboard due to a corrupted bios install

HP Recommended

DGrove, hi thank you for explanation.  I understood updating by windows is rather dangerous than I think.  I will do what you recommend.  

By the way may I ask a few more?

Do I really need to update Bios?  So far I don’t have problems but I’d like to know how effective when doing bios updating on “z400” especially. 

PS. If you write the link to download bios files, I appreciate more.

 

HP Recommended

again, READ the attached docs included with the bios or available separately they will describe all bios changes and if the update is required or recommended

 

HP support/files can be found on your regional (or this US site) HP site

 

a  simple way to find drivers/bios is to use "google" and look for  "drivers HP z400"  the first link will be for the HP driver site 

 


HP Z400 Workstation Software and Driver Downloads | HP ...
support.hp.com › us-en › drivers › selfservice › hp-z400...
Download the latest drivers, firmware, and software for your HP Z400 Workstation.This is HP's official website that will help automatically detect and download ...
 
HP Recommended

Hello DGrove!  Thank you very much.  Yes, I have read this linked pages.
But here are my questions still.
1.  I am not sure why but it does not detect my Z400 automatically.

2.  Then I manually find download page but HP offers it only with Windows 8.
3.  Then I found BIOS Configuration Utility (BCU) 2.50 Rev. 3.  This version Is already applied to my second Z400.

4. First Z400 is applied with BIOS 786G3 version 3.57 as mentioned before.  This first Z400 is used machine which I purchased from second hand store.  So I do not know how previous anonymous owner installed it.

I hope I make my issues clear here and again thank you DGrove for your support.

 

HP Recommended

the BCU program is not a bios update, it's simply a program that runs under windows and allows setting some bios options from within windows

 

the Z400 was "EOL" end Of Life when win 8.0 came out and fully out of HP support by the time win 8.1 was released, so why would you expect to see windows 10 updates? this is why i told you not to run the windows bios updater designed for previous OS's under win 10  and to use either the Bios update option (enter bios and select bios update) or the DOS update either of these methods do not rely on a installed OS, and are safe to run

 

download the latest bios release by selecting either win 7 or win 8 as the OS on the HP site, extract the bios file and you will see a DOS folder inside this folder which is the latest bios file " xxxxx.bin " this is the actual bios file that is used to do a direct bios or DOS mode bios update

 

Please READ THE INCLUDED DOCUMENTATION, it covers how to install the bios,

 

i'm getting tired of telling you this, .......reading the documentation will prevent you from asking questions like how do i?

HP Recommended

Hello. I recently bought a second hand Z400 and I updated the BIOS.  The workstation is on W10, so on the HP download page I had to select W7 as an OS to see the BIOS update download. 
The Windows EXE should have opened a program, with a button to click on, to reboot and flash the BIOS, but it didn't work, just opened an HTML file. But on C: is created a directory called SWSetup. In it, one of the subdirectories is HPQFlash. There, double click HPQFlash.exe and your PC will reboot and flash the BIOS. It was very fast, with only one reboot.

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