Upgrading an HP Z440 Workstation

[Bill_To]

Hi 

I also use a PoweShell script developed by Chris Titus to get a lean and mean W10 or W11 installation.

You must choose wisely or you can break some stuff in Windows. But if you go to far you can reverse the tweaks by running the script again.

And, as we always tell everyone in here, have an offline system image backup if you bork Windows! 😃

Regards

[Bill_To]

Hi

I will try the W11 bypass OOBE tweak on a new W11 install as I am upgrading some components on a PC next week.

Just bought:

Asus X670E MB

Ryzen 7900X

A couple of sticks of G.Skill DDR5 EXPO memory.

I'm going to keep the 7900X cool using a Noctua NH-U12A Chromax.Black.

Can't wait to get the new parts. PC building is fun!.

Regards

[NonSequitur777]

@Bill_To,

Yes indeed, it is!

Kind Regards,

NonSequitur777

[NonSequitur777]

@Paul_Tikkanen,

Thank you for your feedback -I will use this Windows 11 Pro (version 23H2) download site to upgrade Windows in my HP Z440 Workstation: Download Windows 11 (microsoft.com).

Kind Regards,

NonSequitur777

[NonSequitur777]

Dear Forum,

And there we go -upgraded to Windows 11 Pro version 23H2:

Kind Regards,

NonSequitur777

[NonSequitur777]

Esteemed Forum,

Upon closer inspection, found out that the HP Z440 Workstation's 700-watt dual 6-pin PCIe power connectors are not HP-specific, meaning, I can hook up industry standard ATX 6-pin to 8-pin PCIe power adapter cables after all.  I had one of them, which is what I needed to install an RTX 2080 Super, which requires one 6-pin and one 8-pin PCIe power cables.

Also added a 1TB Samsung 980 M.2 NVMe SSD using an M.2 NVMe SSD to PCIe adapter as a secondary drive using a PCIe x8 to PCIe x8 extension cable because the RTX 2080 Super is a 2.5 x slot wide graphics card, covering up two PCIe x8 slots, leaving only one PCIe x8 slot (see #22) more or less accessible:

This PCIe x8 slot is accessible using a flexible 90° PCIe x8 extension ribbon cable adapter:

And also added a 1TB Samsung 870 QVO SATA SSD as an additional secondary storage drive.

Using Intel's XTU (Extreme Tuning Utility) v.6.5.2.40 to disable the Processor Integrated VR Efficiency Mode:

Reran the PassMark performance software with predictably better results:

Link: PassMark Software - Display Baseline ID# 2058587.

Will rerun the tests with an RTX 3090 once the additional 6-pin PCIe to 8-pin PCIe power adapter cables show up.

Kind Regards,

NonSequitur777

[NonSequitur777 · Accepted solution]

Forum,

The heavy-duty HP (p/n: 721859-001) 6-pin to 8-pin PCIe power adapter cables arrived:

Installed an RTX 3080 -will try out an RTX 3090, but it sort of is a pain to remove it from my Asus PRIME Z390-P gaming platform.  The RTX 3080 is a massive graphics card (including the additional GPU backplate cooling heatsink), but even so, it fitted fine:

Ran the PassMark performance test:

Link: PassMark Software - Display Baseline ID# 2059545.

And in addition, ran UserBenchMark:

It is clear that both the i7-6900K and the graphics card would benefit from some additional optimization.

[EDIT:] Decided to close this upgrade project as my main goals have now been met.

Link: HP Z440 Workstation Performance Results - UserBenchmark.

Kind Regards,

NonSequitur777

[NonSequitur777]

Dear Forum,

The HP Z440 Workstation continues to be eligible for W11 23H2 updates:

The HP Z440 Workstation is not an exclusive Xeon-processor platform!

Kind Regards,

NonSequitur777

[SDH]

NS777,

Sorry I missed this post because it was on a HP forum that I did not know existed, but got lucky and it showed up on a related Z440 google search for me. Great work!

Regarding the TPM 2.x question. This motherboard's Infinion chip is meant to go back and forth with TPM 1.2 or 2.x, but I've not messed with it. Initially they all came with it toggled to 1.2 and later some were toggled to 2.0. I've seen this on eBay motherboard bar code labels for late release versions. That left side set of part numbers shows the official HP motherboard options, and each motherboard only has one "branding". IIRC there is some big number limit on the times you can shift back and forth. Given the Rufus method of upgrading into W11 negating need for TPM 2.x I've ignored the issue. DGroves has given a hint that the HP directions/methods are unnecessarily obtuse. I'm sure he has it figured out, but my guess is it is a tar-baby issue that he does not want to touch in the open.

One quick question... on the Intel Ark site for that Core processor you have running in your Z440 it states that the memory the processor uses is non-ECC. Are you seeing that it is stable and running with the ECC Registered memory that we would normally run on the HP-certified Xeon processors in the Z440? Or did you need to shift your installed memory?

Regardless, nice of you to share this... you might want to put a brief note and link on the HP Workstation forum to let more Z440 aficionados see your breakthrough primary post.

[NonSequitur777]

@SDH,

Thank you very much for your feedback -much appreciated!

Yes, the Samsung server ECC registered RAM is running very well and flawlessly even with the Intel i7-6900K processor installed, despite its specs suggesting otherwise:

I think that the reason why ECC memory does work with a (very) limited number of Intel Core CPUs on this platform is because the HP Z440 Workstation motherboard and HP BIOS upgrade tweaks are allowing it to.  Obviously, HP doesn't advertise this feature at all, since their specs only lists Xeon processors as being compatible: the Intel Xeon E5-16xx v3 and E5-26xx v3 processor series (22 nm Haswell) and the Intel Xeon E5-16xx v4 and E5-26xx v4 (14nm Broadwell) processor families.

Another interesting feature of the 6th gen i7-6900K I installed is that it allows 2400 MHz RAM speed, whereas virtually all other 6th gen Intel processors only go as far as 2133 MHz.

Anyways, how would I go about to put a brief note and link on the HP Workstation forum to let more Z440 aficionados see my discussion thread?

Kind Regards,

NonSequitur777