Dell PERC 6/i Integrated Firmware Update

1. When viewing SATA physical disk properties from Ctrl-R or other management applications, the Vendor Identification will be translated as "ATA" followed by blanks.

2. If all physical disks making up a virtual disk are removed from the system or enclosure, the RAID controller will delete the virtual disk. If the disks are later re-inserted, they will be marked foreign and can be imported using a management application.

3. If a virtual disk is configured with write-back cache enabled and some or all of its physical disks are removed from the system or enclosure, the RAID controller will preserve the virtual disk's write cache. The controller will flush the preserved cache when the physical disks are replaced and the foreign configuration is imported. Any attempt to update controller firmware will be blocked when cache is preserved for a virtual disk.

4. Physical disks determined to contain a foreign configuration are not available for configuration as a new dedicated or global hot spare, or as a member of a new virtual disk. The foreign configuration must be imported or cleared from the physical disk before it may be used as a hot spare or member of a virtual disk. Physical disks with a foreign configuration will not appear on the Create New VD screen in Ctrl-R.

5. Prior to performing a virtual disk migration to another system, the source system must be powered off before removal of the physical disks to preserve the correct virtual disk state. This is not required for the target system and the physical disks may be inserted while the system is powered on or off.

6. The controller restricts the importing of virtual disks that are undergoing RAID Level Migration or Capacity Expansion. Do not interrupt virtual disks that are performing either of these operations because it will disable the ability to import the virtual disk and the data will be unavailable. Dell recommends that the user perform a data backup before starting these operations.

7. EMM changes or drive migrations are not supported during a Capacity Expansion or Raid Level Migration. This may cause the VDs to go offline. Dell recommends the user to perform a data backup before starting these operations.

8. This version of firmware will not ensure complete compatibility with an older version of management applications. OpenManage 5.5 or greater is recommended.

9. It is recommended that the customer upgrade the management application and device driver to the latest version available from Dell at the time of installation of this firmware.

10. Important Information for Update Packages for Microsoft Windows

a. Do not run other applications while executing Dell Update Packages.
b. Do not run storage controller update packages if the controller is in use
by other applications. The firmware upgrade may fail if any of the
RAID controllers in the system are performing I/O background tasks
(consistency checks, background initializations, rebuilds, or
reconstructions). Allow the background tasks to complete before
attempting to upgrade the firmware. Patrol Read tasks will not affect
firmware upgrades.

11. Important Information for Update Packages for Linux

a. Do not run other applications while executing Dell Update Packages.
b. If the following error occurs, "Error while loading shared libraries:
libstdc++.so.5: cannot open shared object file: No such file or
directory", you must install the compatibility libraries. These
libraries can be found on the installation media or online. To install
the compatibility libraries, use the following commands:
"rpm -ih compat-libstdc++-33-3.2.3.-*.i386.rpm" for RHEL 4 or 5
"rpm -ih compat-libstdc++-5.0.7-*.x86_64.rpm" for SLES 10
c. When Update Packages stop abruptly due to a power outage or abnormal
termination, perform the following steps:
- Remove the lock file.
- Type the following command: rm -f /var/lock/.spsetup
- Run the Update Package again to reapply the update.
d. Do not ru

Dell Update Package Instructions

Download

1. Click Download File to download the file.
2. When the File Download window appears, click Save to save the file to your hard drive.

Installation
1. Browse to the location where you downloaded the file and double-click the new file.
2. Read over the release information presented in the dialog window.
3. Download and install any prerequisites identified in the dialog window before proceeding.
4. Click the Install button.
5. Follow the remaining prompts to perform the update.

Hard Drive Installation (via WinZip) with Setup.exe File

Download

1.Click Download File, to download the file.
2. When the File Download window appears, click Save or Save this program to disk and click OK. The Save In: window appears.
3. From the Save In: field, click the down arrow then click to select Desktop and click Save. The file will download to your desktop.
4. If the Download Complete window appears, click Close. The file icon appears on your desktop.

Install

1.Double-click the new icon on the desktop.
2.The Self-Extracting window appears and prompts you to extract or unzip to "C:\DELL\DRIVERS\F96NR". (Where 'F96NR' is the name of the file to be downloaded). Write down this path so the executable (I.e.Setup.exe) file can be found later.
3. The Self-Extractor window appears.
4. Click OK.
5. After completing the file extraction, if the Self-Extractor window is still open, close it.
6. Click Start button and then click Run.
7. Type "C:\DELL\DRIVERS\F96NR" (where 'F96NR' is the name of the file) in the Open textbox and then click OK.
8. Follow the on-screen installation instructions.