Sun X4100 Server – LSI Controller and Firmware Update

Overview

This article covers the best procedure for updating your ILOM firmware. I found the SUN documentation very sparse on this important topic. I read your PDFs and decided to use ILOM to do this instead of the command line where it was a bit more documented.

The scenario I found myself in was that I was experiencing silly network interface issues, specifically with the “nge” interfaces. For example, I would configure nge0 with an IP address and everything would be fine until I started transferring a file through it. When transferring a file, it started fine, but stopped halfway through, and after the crash, I could no longer connect to the server over the network, only through ILOM. Opening the console through ILOM and ifconfig only showed my localhost interface and the nge0 was gone. Same behavior if I set nge1 as well. At first I thought it was a driver issue, but after trying some Nvidias drivers, both new and old, the same thing happened.

Grades:

  • You must apply firmware updates in stages.
  • Our server in this example is a Sun Fire X4100 M2 server
  • I assume you have physical access to the server to access ILOM. If you are remote and your ILOM is already configured, go to step 4.
  • I assume you already know your ILOM password if it is not the default password listed below.
  • Remember that if you mess something up here, your server is unlikely to boot and you’ll need to contact a Sun technician or follow the other guide on my wiki.
  • An administrator I know caused the LSI driver update installation to freeze during flash and the server would not boot until it was completely powered down and the AC power cords were removed for the SP to shut down. When it was rebooted, the SP found the LSI card again and the flash worked.

Procedure

1. Download your files from Sun.
2. Configure your ILOM with a pluggable address. I choose 192.168.2.2 for my ILOM. Log in to your ILOM and do the following:
cd /sp/network

set pending ipaddress=192.168.2.2

set pending IP netmask = 255.255.255.0

set pending IP gateway = 192.168.2.1

set pending ipdiscovery = static

setcommitpending=true

3. Set your laptop’s network card to be 192.168.2.1/24 and connect a crossover cable from your laptop’s NIC to the network management interface on the back of the server. Open Firefox and enter “https://192.168.2.2” and you should press ILOM. root/changeme is the default username/password.
4. The first thing we need to do is figure out what updates we need to do. Sun misses a bit here and instead of being able to get the latest firmware, apply it and be on the latest revision, we have to apply each version in order. So for my M2 it ended up being 5 different firmware updates.

When you log in to ILOM, you will be on the Releases page. Here you can see your current installed version. So log in there and make a note of your version number.

Now if you look at the README html file in the software you downloaded in step 1, it will tell you which version to update to. Ex:


Ilom.x4100M2-2.0.2.10-r35249.ima: This file contains the Integrated Lights Out Manager
(ILOM) firmware version 2.0.2.10 and the BIOS version 81 needed to upgrade to
software release 2.1. For instructions, see the Sun Fire X4100 M2/X4200 M2
Server Software Release Notes for Software Release 2.1 on your product documentation web site.

Therefore, you should review these README files now that you know your version of ILOM and find whichever is the closest update and start from there. In my case I had to apply version 1.4, 2.0, 2.0.1 and 2.1 software in that order. Once you figure out where to start, continue to step 5.

5. So the update itself is not too difficult. First we need to shut down our guest operating system. Init 0 or stop /SYS from ILOM.
6. When the operating system is idle, click the Maintenance tab. You must enter maintenance mode to do this, so click the Enter Maintenance button.
7. Next, browse to the image file you downloaded. This should be the correct version, remember we found this out in the previous steps. Click Upload File and you will be taken to the Firmware Verification page. Confirm that everything looks good here and is what you intended. If so, click Start Update.
9. You should access the Update Status page. Sit back and let this do its thing.
10. Once finished, you should get an update complete window indicating that the SP has been reset.
11. Your firmware and BIOS are up to date at this point and you should be able to start the operating system by typing start /SYS from the ILOM. However, if you have a couple more versions to apply, repeat from step 6. The first two I updated I ended up confirming that the OS showed up after each flash, but now I only do the updates once, then apply the latest LSI update. It’s your decision, obviously the safest thing is to confirm that everything is fine after each update.
12. Once you are on the latest version, it is time to update your LSI firmware.

LSI Firmware Update

After updating your SP firmware and BIOS, it is good practice to update your LSI controller firmware to the latest version. You will notice on the download page that each version also comes with a bootable iso image to update the LSI driver. So unlike SP firmware, you can get the latest version of this software and apply it. So, assuming you’ve completed this process, let’s continue:

Procedure

  • 1. Download your files from Sun.
  • 2. Burn the .ISO file to a disc. For version 2.1 of the software, the file name is FW12390_B61801.iso. However, always go with the latest and greatest.
  • 3. Insert the CD into the CD-ROM drive and reboot your server so that it boots from the CD.
  • 4. Enter 1 when asked what to do.
  • 5. Wait for it to finish.
  • 6. Reboot your server and remove the CD as POST.
  • 7. Your server should now be up to date and you can get support from SUN without running around.

Problem solving

The only thing I have noticed is that it is sometimes necessary to dump your browser’s cache, both cookies and save files, if the web application becomes unstable. By flaky I mean you get the Ready. errors with a yellow exclamation mark or crashes when checking your firmware or something similar.

In some cases where users use a password longer than 16 characters, they may not be able to log in to the Web GUI until their password is reset to a password shorter than 16 characters.

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