The same string is in our KVM IPMI: “Product Name: X10SLH-F/X10SLM+-F” and in the BIOS, but if you go the supermicro site you will find that
X10SLH-F has C226 chipset (supports video in the CPU)
X10SLM+-F has C224 chipset
and because we use the video in the CPU we know our motherboard is X10SLH-F and we downloaded the BIOS firmware for it. You also could check your chipset with lshw command.
STEP 1) Download and unpack the SUM (Supermicro Update Manager) and the BIOS zip file
During the BIOS flashing your console could have seemed unresponsive for several minutes, but it is OK, the flash process is about 10 minutes. Then reboot and wait for several automatic resets of your system and after that when your system reaches the OS boot you should reboot again and reset your BIOS to the optimized defaults and then you can tune it as it was before.
The newer Supermicro motherboards have the ability to update the system BIOS from IPMI Web management or with a Supermicro tool called
“Supermicro Update Manager (SUM)”
This tool consists of a linux cli and it works on most of the X9/X10/X11 Supermicro systems. If you have one of these motherboards you probably could update your BIOS under linux console and throwing away your freedos cd prehistoric update process (probably coming soon). If you’ve used Supermicro with for ages you probably are aware of the problem with the updating the BIOS, their tool is an old DOS flash utility, which could be used under MS Windows and with linux servers we got a problem! But not any more! Recent motherboards with built-in IPMI modules have “BIOS Update” option in the web interface (under Maintenance menu), but you need a license (which by the way is not expensive).
So if you happen to have such server you could give a try to SUM linux cli (yes they made a linux cli and even a freebsd one!). With the SUM cli you could do more than just update the BIOS (which is pretty important) here are the functions you can do Key Management, System Checks, BIOS Management, BMC Management, System Event Log, CMM Management, Storage Management, Applications (through the network) and for some of them you still need a license, but for BIOS update you do not need if you do it as Supermicro says
In-Band
which basically means from the server you want to update (or in general use it). KEEP IN MIND this method will reset your BIOS options to DEFAULTS!!! In fact you need a license to use preserve settings you can see the output of the SUM help for the command UpdateBios. So save your changes to recover them after the update!
And here we present a BIOS update with SUM on one of our Supermicro servers with motherboard X11SSV-M4F
So the BIOS version was 1.0 reported by lshw:
[srv@local ~]# lshw|head -n 25
srv@local
description: System
product: Super Server (To be filled by O.E.M.)
vendor: Supermicro
version: 0123456789
serial: 0123456789
width: 64 bits
capabilities: smbios-3.0 dmi-3.0 smp vsyscall32
configuration: boot=normal chassis=server family=To be filled by O.E.M. sku=To be filled by O.E.M. uuid=00000000-0000-0000-0000-111111111111
*-core
description: Motherboard
product: X11SSV-M4F
vendor: Supermicro
physical id: 0
version: 1.02
serial: 112233000044
slot: To be filled by O.E.M.
*-firmware
description: BIOS
vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
physical id: 0
version: 1.0
date: 10/18/2016
size: 64KiB
capacity: 15MiB
And here are the steps to do:
STEP 1) Download the SUM cli – Supermicro Update Manager and unpack it in your server
[srv@local ~]# cd
[srv@local ~]# unzip X11SVMF8_308.zip
Archive: X11SVMF8_308.zip
creating: X11SVMF8.308/
inflating: X11SVMF8.308/AFUDOSU.SMC
inflating: X11SVMF8.308/CHOICE.SMC
inflating: X11SVMF8.308/FDT.smc
inflating: X11SVMF8.308/FLASH.BAT
inflating: X11SVMF8.308/Readme for UP X11 AMI BIOS.txt
inflating: X11SVMF8.308/X11SVMF8.308
The file “X11SVMF8.308” is the BIOS firmware of the motherboard. As you can see the prehistoric DOS executable flash utility is still distributed and is supported method of updating.
As you can see we got critical warning! You may not have the critical, but if you do you need to run the command second time to really flash the new BIOS firmware. So here it is, AFTER rebooting your server login again and execute the command again:
And there you have it you updated the BIOS of your server successfully. KEEP IN MIND the BIOS settings are reset to Defaults! When you restart the server the second time (if you get the critical warning or the first time if you do not) you should load the optimized defaults and change your settings according your needs. Go to BIOS and load the optimized defaults and change the settings according your needs (or your backup).
[srv@local ~]# lshw|head -n 25
srv@local
description: System
product: Super Server (To be filled by O.E.M.)
vendor: Supermicro
version: 0123456789
serial: 0123456789
width: 64 bits
capabilities: smbios-3.0 dmi-3.0 smp vsyscall32
configuration: boot=normal chassis=server family=To be filled by O.E.M. sku=To be filled by O.E.M. uuid=00000000-0000-0000-0000-111111111111
*-core
description: Motherboard
product: X11SSV-M4F
vendor: Supermicro
physical id: 0
version: 1.02
serial: 112233000044
slot: To be filled by O.E.M.
*-firmware
description: BIOS
vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
physical id: 0
version: 1.1
date: 03/08/2018
size: 64KiB
capacity: 15MiB
We use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. We do this to improve browsing experience and to show (non-) personalized ads. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional
Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.