BMC Update Failed Now I cannot update BMC or the BIOS

Richie225,

Just so you are aware, there is a chance that the loss of power during the update may have damaged the Drac. There are a couple things we can try, to get the Drac back communicating, to see if that is the case. I just wanted you to be aware of the situation. 

First thing I would try is to see if you can access the Drac BIOS (CTRL-E) during startup. If you can then you may want to try resetting the Drac to factory defaults. You will have to reconfigure the IP and network settings for it if so, but it may get it back online. 

The other thing we can try is to download and run this, It is 32 bit diagnostics. Once you run it it will assist you in creating the bootable media to use for it. 
While creating that, download this update and extract the files to a newly formatted USB key.

Boot to the 32bit media and then exit from it's menu to the command prompt. Run the extracted update file from the USB in that command prompt with /forcetype flag after the file name. for example (update.exe /forcetype)  This causes the update to force the install. 

Let me know if this helps resolve the issue.

Thank you for the response! When I press CTRL + E during bootup this does nothing. When I boot the the diagnostics CD I am able to navigate to the USB drive but it will not run any of the .EXE files it either says this cannot be run in DOS or needs to be run in WIN32. Any other suggestions on how to install it at boot up or am I missing a step?

Also, if we are unable to force the update; what would need to be replaced to repair this? Also, I am not seeing a DRAC boarded added to my system, the data sheet said that BMC came with it. Is it part of the System board?

And I was afraid the board was going to fry as soon as the power went out. Perfect timing...

Just to clarify, did you run the exe file from within the OS on the system that downloaded them, to extract the files? You would then need to go to the folder where they were extracted and copy that to the USB key. Just making sure.

Well to clarify the clarification. Here is what I tried to use based off your post. I download and created the diagnostics disc. Then I download 2950_ESM_Firmware_4NNNG_WN32_2.50_A00.EXE which is the Update Package for Windows from this link: BMC

Now that is a 4MB self extracting/installation file. What I did was using WinRar, I extracted the files from the package and placed those on the USB key. When I went to install it that is when it said it could not be run in dos mode, or that it is designed for win32. To note this is a 64bit system if that makes a different as I read that BMC uses both 32 and 64bit communications.

Now something I was able to do was using Dell's tool USBKeyPrepA00, I was able to create a bootable USB key and reflash my BIOS. Reflashing the BIOS took care of some other instabilities in the OS however I still cannot flash the BIOS from windows due to a communication error. If I try to do this with the BMC update it is too large for a 16bit DOS partition which is what that tool creates. Also, by reflashing the BIOS I now get a new error when trying to update the BMC, instead of a communication error I get a This is not compatible with your system error which makes me "feel" as though this is a step forward. So if there a way to create a bootable self installer like the BIOS flash one that would fit on one device or is there something wrong with the manner in which I am extracting the files then using the CD to boot then navigating to the flash drive and trying to run it.?

Something else I tried:

I also tried to use the IPMItool with the commands ipmitool mc reset cold and ipmitool bmc reset cold, and they were giving me NO HOSTNAME SPECIFIED errors. originally i set up an IP on this card for access but when adding in -H 10.0.x.x (ip of the server) it will still give the same error NO HOSTNAME SPECIFIED

This might be irrelevant but does the IP assigned to the NIC card through BMC at boot up (CTRL+E settings) need to be different then the IP assigned to the Network card in Windows for communication to the board to work properly? Or can/do they need be the same? 

Richie225,

The IP does need to be different between the OS and the Drac settings. If you have them the same there will be a conflict.