[Official] HP 290-p0043w Owner's Thread

Correct. I have the mobile app; really don’t think I ever paid for it, but I’m able to use them, so must have. But no syncing unfortunately, and not worth Plex Pass pricing for that alone.

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Mine came in this am…its a beaut!!! Updating the firmware and getting ready to put in a samsung 256gb nvme m.2 ssd. wish me luck! :wink:

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Can you show link how to upgrade firmware ?

Is there a specific Quad Port Gig NIC that people are buying for this?

Something like this ok? (which includes both brackets):

EDIT Seller accepted $22 Offer if anyone cares…

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Yup, that will work great.

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Wow. I finally caved. 2 grade A’s at $109 each shipped.

:sos::crying_cat_face::skull_and_crossbones:

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Thanks… and assume if I have a HP EX920 M.2 NVME laying around, it would work well (for the Plex box)?

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Yep! FYI the NVMe drive only works at 2x speed, not the full 4x, but it’ll still be way faster than SATA. Other than that it works fine.

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Just got mine, and came on to ask if there was an m.2 slot. Sweet. Where on the board is it located?

A little off topic, but I have another box I started to setup for Plex running Ubuntu. Can I just move that SSD into this? (I’m a Linux noob, and know that doesn’t work great if at all with Windows).

Yes, the board has one m.2 NVME slot. Here’s a layout of the board directly from HP, which shows its location:

image

As for moving your existing SSD, yes it would be possible. Besides the m.2 slot, the chassis also has one drive slot for a 2.5" or 3.5" drive.

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Helpful layout, thanks. M.2 slot was hiding under the drive cage. Was going to use this for pfsense, but I’m going to try it first as a Plex box using cloud storage. Will put my 2.5” 250gb SSD from my other box I started into this one. And if I like it how it works, I’ll switch to my m.2 512gb drive.

Can someone say is there any place between m2 nvme and hdd cage bottom for installing aluminum radiator on m2? How tall radiator can be?

There’s plenty of room. Any regularly sized NVMe heatsink will fit.

If you want to enable Wake-on-LAN for the onboard NIC in these systems, there are two places where it needs to be enabled. Here’s a quick guide:

0. Enable it in the BIOS
  • Press F10 several times immediately after you press the power button.

    • If your keyboard requires you to enable a function lock to use the F keys, you can alternatively press Escape several times until the system menu pops up, and then choose F10 to enter the BIOS settings
  • Go to Power > Hardware Power Management

  • Enable S4/S5 Wake On LAN, then press F10 to accept the setting

  • Go to File > Save Settings and Exit and choose Yes to save the settings and reboot

1. Enable it in your OS
  • Ubuntu Server

    • It’s best to run these steps directly on the system instead of using a remote terminal. If you mis-type something, you could accidentally disconnect your system from the network.

    • First, grab the MAC address and interface name of your NIC. Run ip addr and you should get an output similar to this:

      • The interface name is the first part in the list for each device. If you have multiple interfaces, look at the IP address for each interface to make sure you get the correct one. In my case it’s enp2s0.

      • The MAC address is on the second line of each device. The onboard NIC should start with c4:65:16.

    • Now that you have the interface name and MAC, you need to edit the netplan. First, make a backup of this file just in case you want to go back to defaults at some time. Run

      sudo cp /etc/netplan/50-cloud-init.yaml /etc/netplan/50-cloud-init.yaml.bak
      
    • Then, open the file for editing. Run

      sudo nano /etc/netplan/50-cloud-init.yaml
      

      and you should get a file that looks something like this by default:

    • You need to add a couple lines to this file, and their placement is important, including the spaces at the front. You need to use spaces, not tabs, to indent, and the number of spaces must match from line to line in the same group. If you copy and paste, make sure you get all the spaces.

                  wakeonlan: true
                  match:
                      macaddress: c4:65:16
      
    • The first line, wakeonlan: true, is indented by 12 spaces, with a single sapce beween the colon and the true

    • The second line, match: is also indented by 12 spaces

    • The third line, macaddress: c4:65:16 is indented by 16 spaces, with a single space between the colon and the c4:65:16 portion.

    • When you’re done, your file should look something like this, and it should be easy to spot if you spaced something incorrectly.

    • Save the file (press Ctrl+O and then Enter to save and then close nano (Ctrl+X). Now, you need to apply these changes. Run

      sudo netplan apply
      
    • If you didn’t get any errors, run

      sudo ethtool <interface name> | grep Wake-on
      

      and verify that you get the following output:
      image

      • The Wake-on: g is the important part. If it’s not the letter g then check your work and try again.
  • Ubuntu Desktop

    • The steps for Ubuntu Desktop are nearly identical to Ubuntu Server. The only real difference is the spacing in the YAML file.

    • First, grab the MAC address and interface name of your NIC. Click the network icon in the upper right, then click on Wired Connected, and finally Wired Settings
      image

    • In the network settings, click on the gear icon next to the wired connection. In the dialog that pops up, click on the Identity tab and grab the info from the MAC Address box.

      • The MAC address is the first portion, highlighted in yellow. I’m taking these screenshots on a VM, so my MAC is completely different. The HP should start with c4:65:16

      • The interface name is the second piece, surrounded by parentheses and highlighted in blue. My interface is different, yours will most likely be enp1s0

    • Now that you have the interface name and MAC, you need to edit the netplan configuration. First, make a backup of this file just in case you want to go back to defaults at some time. Open a terminal window and run

      sudo cp /etc/netplan/01-network-manager-all.yaml /etc/netplan/01-network-manager-all.yaml.bak
      
    • Then, open the file for editing. Run

      sudo gedit /etc/netplan/01-network-manager-all.yaml
      

      and you should get a file that looks something like this by default:
      image

    • You need to add a few lines to this file, and their placement is important, including the spaces at the front. You need to use spaces, not tabs, to indent, and the number of spaces must match from line to line in the same group. If you copy and paste, make sure you get all the spaces.

        ethernets:
          ens160:
            dhcp4: yes
            wakeonlan: true
            match:
              macaddress: 00:0c:29:28:bb:9f
      
    • Change the interface name on the second line to match your interface, and the MAC address on the last line to match yours as well.

    • When you’re done, your file should look something like this, and it should be easy to spot if you spaced something incorrectly.
      image

    • Save the file and close the editor. Now, you need to apply these changes. The terminal should still be open, run this command in it:

      sudo netplan apply
      
    • If you didn’t get any errors, run

      sudo ethtool <interface name> | grep Wake-on
      

      and verify that you get the following output:
      image

      • The Wake-on: g is the important part. If it’s not the letter g then check your work and try again.
2. Check your work

Find a Wake-on-LAN client for your favorite OS. There’s a client built-in to pfSense under Services > Wake-on-LAN. Unraid has a plugin. There are apps for iOS and Android phones, programs for Windows and MacOS and virtually every current OS. Some programs only require the MAC address of the NIC (gathered in step 1 above), others also require the system’s IP for monitoring whether or not it’s turned on. I’ll leave the program choice up to you, but the test is simple. Turn off the system, then send the Wake-on-LAN signal using the app of your choice and see if the system turns on automatically.

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I was thinking about doing a 16gb NVMe intel Optane Drive for the OS, and maybe a 1TB ssd for all the plex meta data. To make it a quicksync box What do you think of the sizes?

Plex does not like being on a secondary drive on Ubuntu. If you can get it to work, more power to you… but I’d just use a 1TB M.2 NVMe as the main drive if I were you. It’s a lot easier.

https://amzn.to/2Mu2bLs

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The eBay listing is back up for $119 minus 15% if you use the code JUMBOSAVE. My total $101.15 shipped free.

I already run a dual E5-2670 unraid server + Plex docker and a separate Dell R220 I am using for PFSense. I want to try to run Blue Iris for IP cams.

Here are my options:
Use this HP 290 as a dedicated blue Iris machine (requires QuickSync) and upgrade as needed in the future (processor/memory).
Use the HP 290 as a dedicated PFSense box and move the R220 to Blue Iris. Would have to upgrade processor to one that supports quicksync but they are E3-12xxV3 processors so older quicksync technology. Not sure if matters…

Any suggestions welcome.

Thanks!

Update 20200105:
I decomissioned my Poweredge R220 running ESXI and Pfsense and installed Pfsense on the HP box. Added a 16GB Intel Optane NVME drive and a 4 port intel I350 NIC. Working wonderfully. Backed up Pfsense settings on the old box and restored on the new box. I was worried because I run three separate VPN instances/gateways concurrently in addition to normal WAN. Everything is working great and now I am saving a bunch of wattage.

Update 20200106
Ordered a third one. One running Pfsense, one for Blue Iris and another for Plex transcoding, reducing the load from my dual E5-2670 box.

Pro-tip: Be careful pulling that front bezel off. Power/LED PCB is very fragile. Ask me how I know. That PCB now sticks out the side of the case so I can press the connector against it to turn the PC on.

On a side note - installed HP EX900 SSD and this RAM kit with no issue. BIOS update was easy too.

@Nuke for this one, you have to boot into windows and then run HP’s upgrade assistant software. It’ll include a link for firmware that you can download and upgrade it to

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Take the CD drive out before you try to remove the front bezel then release the clips at the top and roll it out and down

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