HP OEM 3080 BIOS flashing - For BAR support

[Mansen]

TLDR; HP hasn't released a BIOS update for their 3080 cards (and I doubt they ever will - It's HP), so I am currently stuck with a reference 3080 card that there is no official tool to update with.

Can anyone help me identify the actual manufacturer (I have been informed HP don't actually make the PCBs and just rebrand other partners like PNY with their own logos), so I can flash the card to said manufacturer going forward? So that I can get a BAR supported BIOS (and maybe get a slightly better BIOS in general)

I'd rather not go in blind cause the card is currently waterblocked and in a loop. So if I end up with a non-posting card, it's going to take hours to mend and re-flash. (Especially given how my motherboard currently does not work with Riser cables due to a less than awesome ASRock BIOS update)

 

[qubit]

You've got a HP branded 3080? Did that come in a prebuilt gaming system?

 

[Dinnercore]

Did you try the Nvidia tool yet? It should tell you if it is not supported by your card, but my Vendor (Inno3D) linked me to it as I have a reference pcb 3090 (NOT Founders Edition) and it did it for me.

NVIDIA Support

nvidia.custhelp.com

EDIT: nvm just figured out that HP is not a supported vendor by Nvidia.

 

[Mansen]

Sure did - Consider it my desperate way to grab a 3080 in a country where they are rarer than minted gold bars.'

It's 100% ref PCB (Got an EK Classic block on it atm) but HP's silkscreened their logo and serial numbers on it.

Did you try the Nvidia tool yet? It should tell you if it is not supported by your card, but my Vendor (Inno3D) linked me to it as I have a reference pcb 3090 (NOT Founders Edition) and it did it for me.

Given how the BIOS is rebranded by HP (I assume only the header info?) none of the official brand tools will work. They all put the card into hibernation, then go "Not our card, contact manufacturer". Yes - All of the tools.

 

[qubit]

Given how the BIOS is rebranded by HP (I assume only the header info?) none of the official brand tools will work. They all put the card into hibernation, then go "Not our card, contact manufacturer". Yes - All of the tools.

That sounds really frustrating. Looks like a risky BIOS flash is the only solution. Not sure it's worth the risk to be honest, but it's your call.

 

[Mansen]

That's exactly why I made this thread - To see if anyone could help figure out who made the card based on the BIOS and information. So I try the least risky flash.

 

[jboydgolfer]

HP hasn't released a BIOS update for their 3080 cards

youre not missing anything.

its certainly not worth ANY risk, even the most minimal, unless you do some very important activity , which will benefit enough from BAR support that it is worth the value of the device or more.

im not trying to discourage you updating, im just telling you ther will be no discernable change after updating over before, unless what i posted above is true

 

[Mansen]

Games need to be coded specifically to utilize BAR - That much is true. But that only means there isn't anything to gain - Today.
Tomorrow is another case - And I genuinely am not holding my breath that HP will ever address this. So... hoping I can convert the card to another brand BIOSwise and keep it there.

 

[qubit]

You're right about wanting the RBAR functionality. TPU has reviewed it and it can give massive performance gains at 1080p, enough to lift the performance of the graphics card up to the next tier. Nobody would want to leave that much performance on the table.

Again, it's that risk and whether you can successfully RMA it should it get bricked. You'd have to send the whole PC in though, not just the card, another factor to consider. I dunno, it's a tough call and I certainly wouldn't wanna feel shut out of an important feature just because I'd bought the "wrong" brand. I'd probably live with it though, unless I could be damn near certain that I could flash it without bricking it.

NVIDIA PCI-Express Resizable BAR Performance Test - 22 Games, 3 Resolutions, RTX 3090, 3080, 3070, 3060 Ti

PCI-Express Resizable BAR, pioneered by AMD, seems to be a magic bullet for unlocking additional double-digit FPS gains. NVIDIA finally released their implementation for GeForce Ampere cards. In our PCIe BAR review, we test the feature on RTX 3090, 3080, 3070, and 3060 Ti in 22 games, at Full...

www.techpowerup.com

 

[Mansen]

I'll be honest - I've never heard of people literally bricking cards like this. Only needing to flash them while another cards is main card.

 

[Caring1]

I'd rather not go in blind cause the card is currently waterblocked and in a loop. So if I end up with a non-posting card, it's going to take hours to mend and re-flash. (Especially given how my motherboard currently does not work with Riser cables due to a less than awesome ASRock BIOS update)

There's your problem, it's not the Bios update it's the riser.
Set the PCI-e version to 3 and the riser should work.

 

[Mansen]

There's your problem, it's not the Bios update it's the riser.
Set the PCI-e version to 3 and the riser should work.

1. Entirely irrelevant to the thread topic.
2. You must think very little of me, if you're telling me to "turn it on and off". Of course I made sure to both reset the CMOS fully and set it to Gen3 fallback. Still isn't working after BIOS was updated. Sure I could rollback, but I'm waiting for the "AMD USB Fix" AGESA update anyhow so cba to rollback my BIOS.

 

[Caring1]

1. Entirely irrelevant to the thread topic.
2. You must think very little of me, if you're telling me to "turn it on and off". Of course I made sure to both reset the CMOS fully and set it to Gen3 fallback. Still isn't working after BIOS was updated. Sure I could rollback, but I'm waiting for the "AMD USB Fix" AGESA update anyhow so cba to rollback my BIOS.

Actually it's totally relevant to this topic as you brought it up, and with that attitude, sionara baby, good luck.

 

[Mansen]

But it IS entirely irrelevant to the topic - Allowing my Riser cable to work doesn't in any way help identify my card's vBIOS or in any way assist in getting BAR to run.

Also it's Sayonara - Since apparently we're being eltist and childish here. (Great forum Y'all have!)

Anyway... before this derails completely.

My end goal is to get BAR support. And since HP is unlikely to get get around to releasing a BIOS update, find a different reference BIOS to replace the one HP slapped onto my card, so I can have BAR support - Hoping to get a qualified guess based on my GPU-Z, BIOS dump and PCB pics (though I assume these won't help at all since it's... well Reference)

My situation with the Riser and motherboard fallback is more of a "This is why I am not just blindly flashing whatever I can grab from the web".

 

[Mansen]

Smol bump.

Still nothing from HP directly.

 

[R-T-B]

Honestly, it should crossflash fine to an nvidia reference bios from the database using the right nvflash that can crossflash.

Should being the key word here.

 

[Solaris17]

Honestly, it should crossflash fine to an nvidia reference bios from the database using the right nvflash that can crossflash.

Should being the key word here.

Since it appears to be totally vanilla, then a forced cross flash to an nvidia branded bios is probably going to be your only way out. And given that HP won't likely do it anytime soon (no surprise they are glacial in everything including enterprise) then it's likely also your only realistic way forward.

Any BIOS flash even sanctioned is at risk.

 

[xrror]

Honestly if I was in this situation, I'd be wanting to flash the card to non-HP to avoid having to deal with this exact BS in the future - I find it weird though that the HP firmware seems explicitly not-supported by tools. If it's a reference card then I'd be looking to see what would likely be the most common and likely supported firmware (founder's edition bios?) and try that.

NOTE: that is just a guess, I don't actually know if the Founder's Edition bios is compatible with your card.

But that said - again - this early in the game is the risk worth it "just" for BAR support. Only you can decide that. There is a slim chance there is a reason they made the bios "blacklisted" but...

 

[Mansen]

Yeah that's the thing. I don't think Founder Cards are comparable to Ref cards at all. I'd need to flash it to one of the reference partner BIOS'es... the question is... which one. Kind of wish I could figure out who made the actual card and let HP firebrand it with their logos and BIOS header edits (the last being an assumption on my part)

Unless of course someone here knows from experience that "Ref is Ref" and I should essentially be able to overwrite using any BIOS that comes from a card without any PCB modifications (and thus no issues with different hardware power limits or the likes)

I've ordered some more softtubing and grabbed a second Riser cable - And ASRock have finally gotten around to releasing a Beta BIOS for my Motherboard that incidentally also fixes the "AMD USB" issue. So I might be able to flash the motherboard first, get my Riser working and essentially be able to throw caution to the wind by POST'ing using a secondary card and leaving the "braindead" 3080 in a slave mode, letting me re-flash it indefinitely till something sticks.

 

[Deleted member 205776]

I'd rather keep a functioning card (a very rare one mind you) rather than risk doing something stupid over a literal marketing gimmick/e-peen points.

 

[Mansen]

I mean... it isn't just a gimmick.

It may not have a lot of relevance for most games out now - And that makes sense, cause games need to be written to make use of the BAR. Like how Gears of War gains a significant performance boost. AND it has the side effect of me getting away from the "HP" aspect of the card.

Anyway ... Not much to do till parts arrive, so I can more safely flash the card and not end up with a Ryzen system with no functioning GPU.

 

[Deleted member 205776]

Yes, keyword now. During the GPUpocalypse.

I'm sure the headaches you'll spend trying to fix a broken card won't be worth the extra 1 FPS if it works.

 

[Mansen]

I mean - Worst case I can re-flash it with another GPU in the PC, no?

Admittedly it's been a hot moment since I last tried BIOS flashing GPUs, but I don't remember being able to literally brick a card with something this tame. It's not like I'm tossing an experimental, modded BIOS on the card, just another reference one from another manufacturer. I'm expecting to need to toss in a GPU from my secondary PC to get image, and then re-run NVFLASH as many times as needed to make the HP 3080 POST properly? Feel free to correct me.

 

[lldsandsll]

This is the most info I can find about the HP 3080: https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/hp-rtx-3080-oem.b8601

Other than that, there's a Foxconn stamp on the board.

 

[wolf]

Cmon guys, why are you trying to talk him out of it? He's already decided he wants to do it and weighed up the risk, bios modding and info is one of TPU's strengths.

I think you're on the right path getting a different card in as the primary and thus being able to flash the 3080 as a slave till you get it right, it seems the least risky given you always have the stock bios to flash back on if needed.