Hi,

-I have a EX470. The system drive has a massive failure. It will not power on even if I connect it to another PC via an external adapter.
-I have another backup of all the data so I'm not worried about that.

-I have a new drive that is 1TB, formatted NTFS. chkdsk shows no errors on the new disk.

-I can not get the EX470 to boot into recovery.
-I tried paperclip and drive removal methods.

I think the SMI files on the motherboard have been lost and I don't have a copy of them.

I've been searching but I can not find a copy of the SMI files so I can create a USB boot. Can anyone supply them?

Thank you,

Craig

Sorry for the late reply. I am relatively new to the forum, and I saw your post. If you still need them, I do have them.

I have written extensively on this subject and sometimes its just a matter of knowing how to identify if the server is in recovery mode or not. First thing is the Health Light on the EX47x will blink Purple and Red when its in Recovery Mode. Second the server will show up as a device starting with the name MININT followed by other things.

Easiest way to force your server to boot into its recovery mode is to back out the system drive and turn it one and watch the health light blink purple and red then seat the system drive and run the Server Recovery Disk.

The other thing worth noting is to make sure the NIC is working or appear to be working the NIC Light on the front of the server is not actually the best indicator so you need to look at the physical NIC to see the LEDs the Green should be solid and the Amber should be blinking. If they are not that way then change the cable or relocate the cable on the switch or router the server is connected to. Better if its connected to the router with a confirmed working Cat5 or 6 network cable.

The last thing to look at is when you first turn the server on if it displays the correct behavior. If you remove the power plug and reconnect it then turn the server on you will see the Drive Lights turn on RED then turn off. You will also hear the fans run a full speed briefly and then slow down which occurs during the BIOS Boot Post.

If the power cord is left connected and there has been no loss of power to the server then when the server is turned on the drive lights will not light up but you will still hear the fans run briefly full speed and then slow down which occurs during the BIOS Boot Post.

As for the SMI the EX47x and EX48x will only boot off its on board SMI USB Area if no other boot devices are found so its important not to have a bootable device in the bottom drive bay or connected to the bottom rear USB Port but I believe no bootable devices should be connected to the server period just to make certain there are no conflicts.

Now it is true that there are times when the SMI will simply fail for one reason or another but its best to rule out all possibilities first before going down the road to finding the SMI Files which is basically just a modified version of WinPE.

Let me know how you make out.

_________________
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