[flashrom] Supermicro success (X8DT3) and failure/bricking (X8SIE).

[Bill Broadley]

First the success.  I upgraded the BIOS on a Supermicro X8DT3 without
problem.

I upgraded it to version 2.0a of the BIOS with a release date of 09/14/2010.

I was asked to send a flashrom -V, attached.

The bad news, my Supermicro X8SIE completely bricked.  During the flash:
# flashrom -w x8sie0.527
flashrom v0.9.2-r1141 on Linux 2.6.38-8-generic (x86_64), built with
libpci 3.1.7, GCC 4.5.1, little endian
flashrom is free software, get the source code at http://www.flashrom.org

Calibrating delay loop... OK.
No coreboot table found.
Found chipset "Intel 3420", enabling flash write... OK.
This chipset supports the following protocols: FWH,SPI.
Found chip "Atmel AT25DF321" (4096 KB, SPI) at physical address 0xffc00000.
Flash image seems to be a legacy BIOS. Disabling checks.
Writing flash chip... Erasing flash before programming... Erasing flash
chip... spi_block_erase_20 failed during command execution at address 0x0
spi_block_erase_52 failed during command execution at address 0x0
Verification impossible because read failed at 0x1000 (len 0x100)
ERASE FAILED!
spi_chip_erase_60 failed during command execution
Verification impossible because read failed at 0x1000 (len 0x100)
ERASE FAILED!
FAILED!
ERASE FAILED!
FAILED!
Your flash chip is in an unknown state.
Get help on IRC at irc.freenode.net (channel #flashrom) or
mail flashrom at flashrom.org!
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
DO NOT REBOOT OR POWEROFF!

I tried to read the image to see if I could tell if it was either the
old ROM or the new:
flashrom -r old-unknown.rom
Reading flash... Read operation failed!
FAILED.
Found chipset "Intel 3420", enabling flash write... OK.
This chipset supports the following protocols: FWH,SPI.
Found chip "Atmel AT25DF321" (4096 KB, SPI) at physical
                   address 0xffc00000.

I found a rather promising mention in the manual of taking a USB key and
copying the BIOS image (x8sie0.527 in this case) to super.rom then hold
down <Ctrl> and <Home> simultaneously during bootup.  Said system turns
on, network lights come on, motherboard controlled fans come up.  The
USB's devices LEDs however never light.

I suspect it's a loss, but I'm open to suggestions.

If I do replace it I'll get another LGA1156 single socket server
motherboard.  Any motherboard that's known to work with flashrom would
be a bonus.

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