Can Z640 run UEFI and Secure Boot?

[BulldogSeventyS]

Hello all. 

As the title suggests. Can the z640 run in UEFI mode with Secure Boot enabled? I recently installed W10 onto a z640 and it was in Legacy Bios mode with Secure Boot unsupported. Is Legacy Bios the default boot mode for the z640 and can it be changed to UEFI before a reset of PC W10 installation? 

I have researched MBR vs GPT drives. Conversion. I somewhat understand the MBR/BIOS - GPT/UEFI requirements. I have made a UEFI bootable flash drive and tried installation onto a GPT drive but it didn't show up in the "drive list". I read this could be lack of necessary drivers for the USB, to make the drive show up but I'm not even sure if I'm on the right track with the USB. 

I have also read that the z640 is not supported for the 1E Bios to UEFI OEM. 

At this stage I'm thinking the answer to my question is "no" but any advice/confirmation is greatly appreciated. Thank you. 

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Hi:

I can't confirm that you can, but looking at the specs for your PC, it should support UEFI and secure boot since the PC could have come with Windows 8.

I have an HP 8200 Elite CMT which was the first HP business desktop in the 8xxx Elite series to support UEFI.

I used Rufus to create a bootable W10 UEFI installer from the W10 ISO file I downloaded from Microsoft.

Your F9 boot options menu should have two lists of bootable devices (EFI and Legacy).

You boot from the EFI USB flash drive and then you should be able to turn on Secure boot.

Now, if Windows doesn't 'see' the drive, I have zipped up and attached below the storage controller drivers your PC should need for Windows to find the drive.

Download and unzip the file to its folder.

Copy the folder to a USB flash drive.

When you are at the screen where Windows can't find the drive, click on the 'Load Driver' option and browse to the storage controller files on your flash drive.

If you check the box, it should only list the compatible driver Windows needs.

Then hopefully, you can proceed with the installation.

[BulldogSeventyS]

Thanks for the reply and advice Paul.

After downloading the drivers onto the USB. I booted into BIOS and selected BIOS Setup/Advanced/Boot Options... And made sure that "UEFI boot options" were enabled. I saved the settings and returned to the Startup Menu. Selected Boot Menu and clicked on the UEFI USB selection to initiate the installation process. 

It worked. I selected one of the drivers that you provided and it helped locate the drive. Once the drive and partitions were located. I was still unable to install on them as they were MBR (for Legacy/BIOS mode). So I used diskpart to clean the drive and format it. There was also the option to format on the Windows setup panel too.

Finished the installation process and used Command Prompt to check "msinfo32". Sure enough the BIOS Mode was UEFI and the Secure Boot State had changed from Unsupported to Off. I was then able to boot into BIOS and turn Secure Boot on. I also opened Disk Manager and checked the drive and the installation process had formatted it to GPT to match the UEFI installation. 

Tha.ks again for the help Paul. Much appreciated! 

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome.

If you want to try out W11 on your PC, see this discussion below for how I got most of my unsupported W11 PC's to upgrade to W11.

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebook-Hardware-and-Upgrade-Questions/Issues-upgrading-to-windows-11... 

If for some reason the PC won't do an in-place upgrade to W11 (I had a couple that wouldn't), you can use the bootable USB installer you made with Rufus to clean install W11, and it should work fine.

[BulldogSeventyS]

Thanks for the link Paul. 

That's why I wanted to enable secure boot. I've already upgraded to TPM 2.O and I know that the requirements can be bypassed "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE" method but I prefer to only bypass the "CPU supported" requirement, if possible. That way I figure it's more secure with Secure Boot enabled and you also get the W11 updates with TPM installed and not bypassed. 

I installed W11 on a Dell T5810 which was already running both BIOS and UEFI. I upgraded it to TPM 2.O and bypassed the "CPU supported". Runs W11 fine and hasn't had any issues so far after a few weeks. 

Both the T5810 and the Z640 have unsupported CPU's for W11. That's what's stopping them from being able to update to W11 via "Update & Security". 

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome.

Some of my HP notebooks didn't even have a UEFI BIOS/Secure boot, had no TPM, and the processors weren't supported.

All notebooks in-place upgraded to W11 22H2 just fine except for one, which I had to clean install W11 22H2 on.

They all run better on W11 than they did on W10 and have gotten all of the security and cumulative updates.

Some of my newer PC's even get some optional updates.

The only problem is...each year when Microsoft releases the new version of W11, you will have to continue to use the hardware check bypass methods to install the new builds.

[BulldogSeventyS]

Thanks.

After reading this I went and installed W11 on my Z240. It doesn't support update to TPM 2.O which is why I hadn't tried. Believing I wouldn't get any updates but you're right. Still getting them.

Before installing W11. I used the same process on the Z240, as I did on the Z640, to reinstall W10 from USB. Changing the C drive from MBR to GPT to get Secure Boot enabled. No problems.

I set up the TPM requirement work around and then downloaded a copy of W11 from the Microsoft website. Selecting the ISO disk image USB/DVD option for another computer. Although I may have messed up here. I didn't download it directly onto my USB. I was then unable to transfer it to the USB stick, getting an error message stating the file was too large. Even though the USB had more than enough space.

Fixed the problem by simply running the installer out of the system download folder. It opened it up by default as a DVD drive and installed from there. I actually have the DVD drive disconnected as I never use it. Not sure if that made any difference?

Anyway... W11 is running great on the Z240! 

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Anytime.

That is great news.