HP ZBook 17 G3 Owners Lounge

I am looking at exactly same upgrade, but have some doubts / questions, maybe you could help me a bit.

1. Were you able to revert later to "discrete only" Bios setting? That's crucial for me due to problem with Thunderbolt Dock.

2. Was the change to .inf necessary, if yes, could you explain a bit exactly why?

3. Are there any problem with overheating of P4000?

4. Was the performance difference between and M3000M and P4000 worth the upgrade? I tried to find some benchmarks of P4000 mobile MXM, but it looks like site do not differentiate between desktop and mobile versions of P4000.

Would really appreciate some more insight.

 

1. Were you able to revert later to "discrete only" Bios setting? That's crucial for me due to problem with Thunderbolt Dock.

- I haven't tried as i don't have a Dock. but I do know there is an issue with using and external HDMI output and performance. For some odd reason, I tried to use a 165hz dell monitor, it wouldn't work. I switched a 60hz 1080p monitor it works. I don't know why but it could be something with either the refresh rate, or G-sync compatibilty. i'm hypothesizing here.

another thing i noticed when I have the external monitor connected, i have to leave the lid on because it takes an extreme performance hit. I'm assuming there has to be some interplay between Descrete and Integrated GPU. I haven't had time to sort it out but, I leave my lid on for full performance when I connect to an external monitor.


2. Was the change to .inf necessary, if yes, could you explain a bit exactly why?

-When HP developed the laptop, it has a hardware list on what is supposed to be the laptop and what's not. hence modifying is necessary


3. Are there any problem with overheating of P4000?

-Not that i know so far. I have played a few games where it was 100% for an hour and it hovers around 60c which is nice. make sure you get extra assortment of pads of 1, 1.5, 2mm thermal pads and of course paste.

4. Was the performance difference between and M3000M and P4000 worth the upgrade? I tried to find some benchmarks of P4000 mobile MXM, but it looks like site do not differentiate between desktop and mobile versions of P4000.

-yes, this is primarily my engineering laptop, secondary games. I prior titles, I couldn't get 60FPS with the m3000m, now i can with the P4000. I haven't done any solidwork type work yet, but the games alone is a good indicator.

i can post particular test results if you wish, just tell me the test and program to compare your m3000m

 

Thanks for the quick reply

1. In my case ( on M3000M) changing Bios settings from Hybrid to Discrete Only, solved most of the problems with external displays, even with the lid closed. The performance on external displays is almost the same as on internal one.

That's why I am curious if it possible to use P4000 with Discrete Only setting instead of Hybrid one. Have you maybe tried that?

2. So in that case drivers will have to be manually edited before each update, am I right? Have you maybe experienced any problems with auto-updates?

4. No need for testing, I you say that difference was clearly noticeable, that encouraging enough for me.

 

- Discrete didn't work. I had to VNC my way in to look at the screen and restart it. Then the LCD backlight stopped working when I was in BIOS untl i put it back into hybrid. I had to shine my phone light. I got a bit worried. I'm not sure what causes it not to work.

2.)yes, I just saved the line for future reference. I actually go by HP update as it's easier to modify because it doesn't have the other OEM's on there.

 

Hello. Zbook 17 G3 work with RTX 3000, RTX 4000, RTX 5000 without modification in drivers. There is needed some modification in mounting holes mxm card.
HP add support to RTX card in BIOS upgrade!


Like you see card have in different place mounting holes than standard mxm.


We need made mounting holes adapter. What i know this is printed on 3D printer. And looks it like on photo below. We need saw some oryginal mounting holes, so we can mount adapter on propher place.


I have only one problem before buying card. I haven't 3D printer and i can't create adapter pattern. Also i tried contact with oryginal chinese poster, but without result.

 

I can help with 3d model if you know exact dimensions

 

BTW, has anyone tried to use 7.4x5.0 power adapter with 7.4x5.0 to 4.5x3.0 converter?

 

Ok small update here, many months later. What I meant by this is that my M5000M couldn't reliably keep 120 fps in games and such. I fought with this forever and figured out that it was because it was being temperature limited to 59C in operation. I got frustrated and due to life stuff got my gaming desktop back up and running. Anyway, just today I pulled the old laptop out of the closet and discovered that HP has released a bios update that fixes the issue entirely. I believe the version number was 1.45a but I just installed the newest bios available (1.52 I think). Now this old system is working great, the bios temperature limit on the M5000M seems to have been raised to 101C.

 

The rx 480 was indeed dead. I sold the G3 & I find a solution to fix the G4 (restore missing options in bios using hp bios configuration utility for that). Now the G4 boot normally with the quadro m1000m.
But new problem : I bought a Quadro p3200 (HP vendor) for the G4. It fits properly in the notebook and appear in device manager (W7 & W10) but I can't find drivers to install it. All drivers I've tested now (from 2018 to 2021) give me an error 43 (device can't be start : a yellow triangle on the NVIDIA GPU in devide manager).
The mod with the .inf file of nvidia setup is not working also in my case. It seems the Quadro P3200, 4200, 5200 aren't compatible with G4.
if anyone has a solution to flash the P3200 vbios or force GPU start in the G4, I take it.

 

If you fail to flash the vbios maybe you should try a modded nvflash. I needed it for my M3000M as the standard nvflash would always return errors. I found it here: https://www.overclock.net/threads/o...or-gtx-950-960-970-980-980ti-titan-x.1521334/
Good luck with your G4.
Also I currently use a 8770w and I am looking for a 17 G3/G4, do you know where I could find either of these for 500€ or less ?

 

Thanks for your suggestion bro but it seems the Quadro PX200 series don't have physical bios on board. Their VBios seem to have been integrated directly on the 17 G5 by HP to prevent backward compatibility with 17 G3/G4/G2. So using NVflash at this stage is impossible cause the software won't be able to detect a GPU without a physical vbios (or maybe I'm wrong). The solution should be to solder a Bios chip on the GPU board before flash it with the correct VBIOS, but I don't know where to find HP VBios for this series. A guy in techpowerup forum said he can provide the original HP Quadro P4200 vbios but still no answer from him. Again if somebody has a solution for me (how to install a Quadro Px200 in a 17 G3/G4), I take it.

You could find good cheap 17 G3 on eBay US (17 G4 are still a little expensive I think). I have the 17 G4 version with Xeon E3 v6 3GHz. It is a good machine but nothing exceptional compare to a 17 G3 (just few more MHz for the Kaby Lake CPU compared to Skylake). They use the same chassis, parts, and components.

 

I didn't even know that. Do the Quadro RTX cards also have this issue ? I found an RTX 3000 for 420€ on ebay, but the screw holes are not the same as on previous generation.
Also did you already buy the card ?

Regarding the 17 G3, unfortunately I live in France and the cheapest one I found (300$ iirc) would cost me 500€ including import charges. Still a good price though. Sucks they don't sell that much in France, my fellow citoyens would rather pay 1000€ for a surface with hd graphics

 

As someone reports previously in this thread:"Zbook 17 G3 work with RTX 3000, RTX 4000, RTX 5000 without modification in drivers. There is needed some modification in mounting holes MXM card.
HP adds support to RTX card in BIOS upgrade!" So it appears that the compatibility problem with Quadro series concerns much more the PX200 series. I have already by the card (a new Quadro P3200).
I will try my luck with a soldered bios chip if I have no other choice. I try to collect information to know exactly how to proceed.
I'm actually in Madagascar bro

 

Oh my god. 17 G3 secured then. Thanks a lot ! I just hope I will find help with tweaking mounting holes and that it does not involve soldering.
One thing I still have doubts with is signal compatibility. With 8770w, only dream color displays are compatible with Pascal GPUs as they can only send lvds signal. I don't think anyone has tried Turing GPUs on it. I will do some research because the cheapest 17 G3 come with EDP panels, the 4k DC ones being much over my budget.
Madagascar ?? Sounds like hell to get parts imported. Good luck to find a bios chip. Have you tried running it on a non-HP laptop ? I am not sure about the whole process but if it doesn't have a bios I guess the procedure is worth nothing.
I wish I knew more to help you... Maybe try your luck in the 8770w forum, some guys are still active and they have had success with pretty significant upgrades.

 

Good news! I found a guy on eBay who sells a modified HP Quadro P4200 (I mean with a custom bios chip already soldered onboard) for anyone interested the link is down. He confirms that after this modification, the MXM GPU works flawlessly in his HP ZBOOK 17 G4 and could potentially work in any compatible laptops (17 G3 included). I asked him if he could provide a custom bios chip for my Quadro p3200 or direction and it's very likely YES. I'll keep you posted on how things are going.

For anyone interested on the modified Quadro P4200, here is the link on Ebay : https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/e110...=ch,segname=segname,crd=crd,url=loc,osub=osub

 

Hi all. I hope people are still looking at this.

has anyone noticed that HP have decided to add in Bios Configiration utility with DreamColour Assistant from portrait displays,
My calibration is not loading up because of it and the module is not able to load any of the profiles or recognise the Quadro so technically I have no dreamcolour display. Just the sharp 4k with a generic horrible windows module

.picture 2 is the dialog I get on reboot every single time r if i try to select load calibration data from image 3
picture 1 is the dialog i get after i press yes or no on dialog 2
picture 4 is the temp file that BCU is trying to write within the dreamcolour assistant software.

If anyone here has had this issue or knows how to fix it, HP refuse to help me because my warranty has ended and are charging me 500 to renew it for just 3 months.

 

Just to confirm the validity of earlier comments, I successfully upgraded to a Quadro RTX 3000.

I'm running Ubuntu Server 20.04.

After installing the CUDA drivers, the card shows up in nvidia-smi. The only testing I've done so far is Pkg.test("CUDA") with Julia 1.6 which passed. I plan to run some machine learning loads on it for fun.

Since I don't move the zbook G3 17 at all, I did minimal work to get this thing to fit. The card is a bit wide, so I removed some of the plastic from the GPU cooling fan with a small hand saw. The plastic was soft and it was super easy. Beware the heatsink mounting holes do not align with with this card. To avoid a short from the screws scratching a trace, I knocked the screws out of the heatsink and have it secured to the board only with the common screws it shares around the CPU. I didn't need to dremel anything to get the VRAM to fit, but did add some thermal padding to keep it all in good contact. During the above tests it never surpassed 60C, but it was also nowhere near 100% full load.

Lot's of fun. I'm looking forward to tinkering with this thing some more.

 

Nice ! Would you mind sharing a picture of the final result ? I am curious as to how you made it fit and if it makes portability impossible.

 

Hello, comrades. My question actually concerns 17 g4 (no owner's lounge)
I own an older 200w 7.4mm charger and thus don't want to get a new 4.5mm charger for g4.
Hp makes a converter dongle but there's no power rating on hp website. https://www.hp.com/au-en/shop/hp-7-4-mm-to-4-5-dc-dongle-k0q39aa.html
At least 1 listing on amazon CA claims it can handle up to 230w. https://www.amazon.ca/e/dp/B079WG48DL
Do you think it can handle 200W? Thanks in advance

 

I've got a corner shaped connector and 230w HP AC brick. It works.

 

You mean under load? My g4 originally shipped with 200w charger so it actually draws that much. Does your pc actually draw 230w +/- ?
There's a corner connector and a corner dongle
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07RWVNHWR
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07CK3Y425
Which one do you won? Hp only make 1 type so I guess yours is Chinese aftermarket model, yes?

 

Like 1st one. Can't say for sure is it a chinese model, bought it in a local store.
I don't think G3 (and G4) eats more than 200w, my brick is HP 230w

 

Hello
I modified my zbook g3 and inserted the quadro p3000 card. So far everything works OK, but the latest drivers from Nvidia do not want to install. Is there anyone who could modify the driver for me? I tried but it failed.

 

Check you board ID, you can find it in Sysinfo,Baseboard product.
In nvblwi.inf, look for P3000 and replace "8270" with what you found FOR THE WHOLE DOCUMENT (Use notepad++)
Then look for the whole "NVIDIA_DEV.1BB9.XXXX.103C" line in the document, and you will find a line starting with %,
Verify that the line PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_1BB8&SUBSYS_8270103C has your baseboard product instead of 8270.
Save the file, restart in troubleshoot and enter startup settings, disable driver signature enforcement.
Install the drivers from setup.exe