Platform Firmware Updates for SPARC Systems

Platform firmware updates for selected SPARC systems are available in the Oracle Solaris IPS support repository in addition to .zip downloads from My Oracle Support (http://support.oracle.com). If you have your solaris package publisher configured to retrieve packages from the Oracle Solaris support repository, you can use the pkg install command instead of downloading and unpacking the .zip file.

Installing the IPS package does not automatically update the firmware of the server because that update requires manual steps by the system administrator and requires power cycling the server. Installing or updating the firmware update package delivers the files to /var/firmware/system/ ServerType. To install the firmware update, follow the instructions in the included README file.

Use the following command to identify the newest available firmware update packages:

$ pkg list -n 'firmware/system/*'

Packages are named pkg:/firmware/system/ServerType. You do not need to install older updates. You can install just the newest update, and then continue to update from there.

Use the pkg contents and pkg info commands to get more information about the packages for your platform.

Example 4-1 Showing Information About SPARC T7 Firmware Updates

The firmware/system/T7-4 package installs the T7-4/sysfw9-7 and T7-4/hwprogrammables1-0-7 packages:

$ pkg install -nv firmware/system/T7-4
           Packages to install:         3
     Estimated space available: 830.81 GB
Estimated space to be consumed: 367.54 MB
       Create boot environment:        No
Create backup boot environment:        No
          Rebuild boot archive:        No

Changed packages:
solaris
  firmware/system/T7-4
    None -> 1.1.0.4.0,5.11:20170726T000710Z
  firmware/system/T7-4/hwprogrammables1-0-7
    None -> 1.0.7,5.11:20160817T161305Z
  firmware/system/T7-4/sysfw9-7
    None -> 9.7.6.2,5.11:20170726T000706Z

Release Notes:
  Sun System Firmware component revisions included with this release:

          Sun System Firmware 9.7.6.b 2017/07/10 15:33
          --------------------------------------------
          ILOM 3.2.10.1.b Mon Jul 10 16:22:42 PDT 2017
          Hostconfig 1.8.6 2017/06/07 09:34
          POST 5.5.6 2017/06/07 09:22
          FWP 1.3.6 2017/06/07 09:15
          Hypervisor 1.17.6.a 2017/06/14 10:14
          OpenBoot 4.40.6 2017/06/07 09:00
          GM 1.8.6 2017/06/07 09:40

          Checksum of Sun_System_Firmware-9_7_6_b-SPARC_T7-4.pkg : 2715457817
          (generated by the /usr/bin/cksum command)

The pkg info command shows that the firmware/system/T7-4/sysfw9-7 package provides Patch p26407491_976b:

$ pkg info -r firmware/system/T7-4/sysfw9-7
             Name: firmware/system/T7-4/sysfw9-7
          Summary: T7-4 firmware
      Description: T7-4 firmware: MOS Patch p26407491_976b
            State: Not installed
        Publisher: solaris
          Version: 9.7.6.2 (9.7.6.b)
    Build Release: 5.11
           Branch: None
   Packaging Date: July 26, 2017 12:07:06 AM
             Size: 33.62 MB
             FMRI: pkg://solaris/firmware/system/T7-4/sysfw9-7@9.7.6.2,5.11:20170726T000706Z

Follow the instructions in /var/firmware/system/T7-4/sysfw9-7/p26407491_976b/README.html to install the firmware update.

After you have installed the pkg:/firmware/system/ServerType package for your platform, you can use the pkg update command to download newer firmware updates. Use the pkg update command with no FMRI to download the most current firmware update package and also install the most current SRU.

For more information about firmware updates, see Oracle ILOM Administrator’s Guide for Configuration and Maintenance Firmware Release 3.2.x or your SPARC server administration guide.