- I tried to upgrade my Supermicro SuperServer 5015A-EHF-D525 IPMI BIOS to have the Heartbleed fixed in it. It failed on me. When I run: lUpdate -f SMT316.bin -i kcs -r y. The not-so-friendly response is: If the FW update fails,PLEASE TRY AGAIN update part 0, the size is 0x800000 bytes Transfer data. 40K bytes 1%ERROR!!
- This is taken from supermicros faq. It was a response from someone having the same issue. Yes, there is way to update your BIOS without buying a E5-2600 CPU by using IPMI Web Browser to update your BIOS. Please contact your Sale Agent or distributor for SKU# SFT-OOB-LIC for purchasing the licensee to activate this product key.
Please either disable the IPMI by setting the JPB1 jumper to pins 2-3 and then update the Bios using a bootable USB flash drive, then enable the IPMI be setting the JPB1 jumper to pins 1-2. Or if you have the OOB remote Bios update license, shut down the system and update the Bios using the IPMI remote interface.
Having received my Supermicro SYS-5028D-TN4T servers for my home lab it's now time to update the BIOS on each unit. This process can be achieved either through bootable media or if you have the correct license key for the dedicated IPMI (Intelligent Platform Management Interface) interface you can update through that.
In my case I don't have a license so I will create a bootable USB drive using the software tool Rufus.
Once Rufus is downloaded it's a simple case of plugging in a USB drive and selecting a few options.
In my case I decided to allow Rufus to check the USB drive for bad blocks as it was a random one I found hidden away in my desk so I wasn't sure what condition it was in.
It goes without saying that any data on the USB drive will be erased as part of this process.
Here we can see Rufus is checking the USB drive for bad blocks.
Once the format is complete I copy the Supermicro BIOS update files to the root of the USB drive. In this instance the ‘LOCALE' folder was created by Rufus and the additional files are from the Supermicro website and contain both the BIOS image itself (X10SDVF6.302) and the supporting files. Note that there are also hidden files which aren't shown in this screenshot – you can of course enable Windows to show these files if you wish.
We now have two options – either insert the USB drive into the server itself or mount it as removable media via the IPMI interface. Both procedures are more or less identical so I will demonstrate updating with the USB drive directly connected in this instance.
I used the IPMI controls to remotely power on the server and then boot from the USB drive.
With the server powered on I connected via the remote console and after giving the system a few moments to boot I pressed F11 to bring up the boot menu.
Select the appropriate boot device from the list, in my case I chose the 'JetFlashTranscend 4GB 8.07' option.
Give the system some time to finish booting FreeDOS.
Once booted I ran the flash.bat command followed by the BIOS image file name. Hmm the old not enough memory problem of DOS systems…
I checked out the autoexec.bat file and noticed some regional settings so decided to remove the entire file along with config.sys. I then tried booting the system again as before – FreeDOS asked me to set some date/time information first.
OK this looks more promising, no more errors about memory and the update process is proceeding.
I left the process running for 5 minutes and came back – we're looking good, the server needs to be shutdown for the new BIOS to take effect.
The BIOS is no longer version 1.0c but now 1.1 – the latest current version.
Also notice that the boot screen now displays the IPMI interface IP address.
The process is pretty simple, it's certainly not as streamlined as updating say a Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) server but it's not rocket science. Other than the little ‘not enough memory' blip it all went fine.
Supermicro makes some really amazing motherboards and are a key piece of my home lab whitebox strategy. I'm incredibly happy with the built-in IPMI and remote KVM / Media abilities that come standard with the X9SCM board. With that said, I recently acquired a pair of Emulex 10102-FX UCNA cards to provide some 10 GbE connectivity testing between two of my vSphere lab hosts, with hopes of adding a 10 GbE switch in the future. For now, the two hosts are directly connected using a cross-over LC/LC SR fiber optic cable.
I did have a bit of difficulty getting the cards to correctly load and become available in vSphere 5.1. After a bit of troubleshooting I finally discovered the root cause: the motherboard BIOS version was too far out of date to support the cards. This post will go over how to easily update the BIOS on a Supermicro board, along with another post that will cover using the Emulex OneCommand software plugin for vCenter to easily discover and update the CNA firmware.
Some call it flashing the BIOS (like me) and others call it updating the BIOS. Either way, the goal is to wipe the old BIOS firmware and load the latest and greatest. The method that I found to be easiest was to use Rufus to create a bootable USB stick, and then just add the Supermicro BIOS firmware onto the USB stick. Here are the three steps to follow:
Step 1 – Grab The Latest Supermicro Firmware
Fire up the Supermicro download page and put in your motherboard model. In my case, it's the X9SCM.
Click the BIOS Downloads or Get BIOS button. The latest firmware will be offered for download, with a giant warning telling you that upgrading firmware is risky business. I strongly recommend making sure that your server is plugged into a UPS before moving forward with the upgrade.
Once you click on the link you'll need to read and accept a EULA. Then you can download the zip file. Inside are a handful of files – the large file with a weird extension is the actual BIOS bin file.
Supermicro Bios Download
Note: There are also two batch files included – AMI_1.BAT is for BIOS 1.1a or lower, and AMI_2.BAT is for BIOS 2.00 or higher. In my case I am running 1.1a so I'll need to use AMI_1.BAT in Step 3.
Extract the contents of the zip to a folder for later.
Supermicro Ipmi Bios Update License Key
Step 2 – Bootable USB Stick With Rufus
If you've not used Rufus before, it's just a simple little app that formats a USB stick so that it boots into DOS. I use it all the time for OS-less firmware upgrades on various servers and components. Download the app, pop in a USB stick (pretty much any size will do), and tell Rufus to make the USB stick bootable. I used the default configuration, but still took a screenshot below for you to refer to.
Once completed, copy over the extracted zip folder from Step 1 and put it in the root directory of the Rufus USB stick. How to update buick intellilink software.
Step 3 – Flash The BIOS
The final step is to insert the Rufus USB stick (or mount it over IPMI) and fire up the server. To make sure that the server boots to the USB stick, enter the BIOS settings before the server boots into the hypervisor and do a manual boot override to the Rufus USB stick. Alternatively, I just end up removing the existing USB stick that holds vSphere ESXi on it because I have no other bootable media inserted – this gives the board no choice but to boot into the Rufus USB stick.
Once the Rufus USB stick has booted to DOS, do the following:
- cd
- Run the update batch file
- If your current BIOS is 1.1a or lower, run AMI_1.BAT
- If your current BIOS is 2.00 or higher, run AMI_2.BAT
- The AMI Firmware Update Utility will launch and erase the flash, then write the new BIOS file to the flash
The final screen looks something like this:
That's it. Easy!
If you used AMI_1.BAT I typically advise rebooting the server and then running Step 3 a second time with AMI_2.BAT instead. It should finish without any final warning messages.
You can remove the Rufus USB stick and reboot the system into your normal vSphere hypervisor environment.
Next Steps
Now that the Supermicro board has been flashed to the latest BIOS, it's time to prepare the vSphere hosts with the proper Emulex CIM extension, UCNA drivers, and leverage the power of the OneCommand vCenter plug-in to update the card firmware.
Supermicro Ipmi Bios Update Key
Continue to the Emulex OneCommand Manager in the vSphere Web Client post!