-> WC>Nope, BIOS punks out at 32 Gig and the USB is 1.1.
-> WC>I tried everywhere to find a BIOS upgrade.
-> WC>They have them for their Vectra server class machines but not those
-> WC>home marketed.

-> NO BIOS upgrade can give you USB-2 Capabilities with the onboard USB-1
-> Chip Set as far as I know.

Yeah after I wrote that and posted it occured it was a hardware issue.
They make USB 2.0 I/O cards though.

-> WC>I'd prefer the H.P.
-> WC>Micron PCI100 168 pin Dimms will work in it even if their web site
-> WC>claims otherwise ( PCI66), assuming of course that's the sort of memory
-> WC>that H.P. uses.

-> You were lucky then as I have found HP's to be VERY picky about memory
-> Chips.                          

I ran a *very* intensive Linux based RAM test utility for about 12
hours, everything checked out perfect :-)    

H.P.'s site of course claimed only their memory would work and directed
you to their vendor at twice the cost of the Micron memory.

-> WC>I have heard tell of Compaqs without the proprietary partition
-> WC>but I've not played with such a one.

-> It is quite easy to get rid of. Of course if you do then you have to
-> use the Downloadable Floppy Set for BIOS Setup and some Comp[aq system
-> maintenance routines.                                   

Yeah  I ran into this on a neighbors machine.
The machine demanded 2 - 720K setup diskettes.
I downloaded those for that model but the machine demanded 1.44
diskettes.
I formatted a couple 1.44's to 720 and that didn't work either.
It's about then I got discusted with Compaqs.

It wouldn't let you into setup which was the reason
for using the diskettes to fix what was broke but no go.

-> I personnaly dumped the Maintenance partition myslef ewhen I passed
out
-> a Compaq machine.

-> WC>The H.P. is likely to have the proprietary SFX power supply as well,
-> WC>Compaq too.

-> Teh minature HP power suply is a prolbem but mostly becasue ot it's very
-> borderline capacity. That of course is whay they made it difficuly ot
-> Upgrade. YOU should NOT load them up very much as the power supply is
-> really too small.

I'm only replacing a hard drive not adding one.
Should I add anything I'll get a USB 2.0 I/O card.

-> The Compaq power supplys I have dealy with Looked standard ATX size. But
-> since I had a couple from machines I parted out I never tried to use a
-> "standard" ATX.
--- Platinum Xpress/Win/WINServer v3.0pr5