Supermicro Bios upgrade fail - BMC can't force ME to recovery mode. Print

Supermicro Bios upgrade fail - BMC can't force ME to recovery mode.

When upgrading bios remotely, and fails, and you try again and get the error:
"BMC can't force ME to recovery mode."

IF you have access to the IPMI still, then you can do:
Option #1

A) Install Supermicro Superdoctor 5 from supermicro (free download), and use the sum.exe tool located in: C:\Program Files\Supermicro\SuperDoctor5\BIOS\sum\sum.exe
B) run this command line:

./SUM -i <IPMI OF SERVER> -u ADMIN -p ADMIN -c UpdateBios --file <PATH TO BIOS FILE> --force_update --reboot

This will force upgrade the Bios and reboot, it takes about 15min, but it works.

Option #2 If you have access to the board and IPMI:

A) Unplug the system power from the outlet.
B) Pull the motherboard/node out and
C) Then, locate the JPME2 jumper very close to the PCI-E slot1 on the motherboard and set it to pins 2-3. The white box around the jumper signifies pin 1.
D) Try to update the Bios again via IPMI.
E) You will need to shut down the system and set the jumper back to pins 1-2 after the successful bios flash.

Option #3 - Super.Rom

According to Supermicro, you can put the bios on a dos usb in the root folder
A) USB Thumb drive formatted as dos
B) Copy Bios to the root / of the drive
C) Rename the bios file to Super.ROM
D) Put into the server, and hold ctrl+home until it boots into bios recovery mode
*Good luck with this one, I never got it to work.