HP Z440 Workstation Upgrade and Improvements

Why #

I had some 32GB DDR4 registered dimms from old hardware and I wanted to do something with those.

I've found that the best bet would be an X99 platform 0, but the Aliexpress boards would only have 4 dimm slots and other used mainboards would need a complete system around: PUS, case, etc..

The HP Z440 1 is a workstation from 2014 that:

• supports 8 dimm slots up to officially 256GB of ram (512GB unofficially)
• supports Intel Xeon v3 and v4 cpus, a lot of them 2
• may be made compatible with standard ATX PUSs using an adapter 3
• the front panel connector pinout has been documented 4
• supports pci-e bifurcation with the latest bios update 5

Where to find one #

Memory #

Density and configurations #

The z440 officially supports up to 256GB in 8x 32GB rdimms 6,
unofficially it can go up to 512GB with 64GB rdimms but you'll get an error about unsupported LRDIMMs in the system.

If you populate all the 8 dimm slots, and don't have the fancy ram cooler shroud from HP:

you'll get this error:

Since I had no intention to spend 70+ euros for a shroud I built myself one, see the fans section.

Fans #

Bottom Fan #

The bottom fan has a mostly normal 4pin fan connector, except it has a different key on it, you'll just need to shave the 2 slim guides on the fan connector to adapt it.

Bottom fan mounting #

I've printed the "HP Z440 Fron fan bracket (92mm fan)" from kiril_nedev (https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4653689)
and the "Fan reduction 120mm to 92mm" from Fixercode (https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6251457).

Note that the reduction is asymmetric and perfect for our case.

This way I am able to mount a 120mm PWM fan I had lying around in my case, the airflow is excellent and directed to the pci-e slots.

DIY ram cooler #

The RAM cooler uses a spcific connector but the pinout has been found 7:

so I've bought the needed parts on aliexpress:

• 2x 4pin pwm fan extension (color: "1 in 1"): https://it.aliexpress.com/item/1005006140447407.html
• Molex 3.0mm connectors (pack of 10, color: Male H Female T 10Se, 2x3P): https://it.aliexpress.com/item/1005007253431348.html

I've removed the connector from the extension, crimped and soldered the Molex pins:
Ground: black
12V: red
Tach: yellow
PWM: blue

the Tach and PWM pins of the two cables will go to a pin each,
while we'll soler together the Ground and 12V ones since those are common:

To allow the molex connector to fit in the custom HP's plastic receptacle you'll need to remove the locking lever, just shave it off with an xacto kinfe.

Mounting the fans #

I've asked "Snoopmasta" 8 to share with me the awesome fan mount design he did for his z440 and he very kindly sent me the files.

I've printed the parts in esun PLA+ and glued it together with Attack (Cyanoacrliate),
the result is very nice:

sources: #

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