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How To Update Dell Firmware on Fedora 20

After a recent build on a Dell Laptop to Fedora 20 I found the need to update the BIOS on the laptop. With Windows this is a simple solution of downloading and installing. With Linux it is a bit more to do.

First we must install firmware-addon-dell.

$ sudo yum -y install firmware-addon-dell

Next we need to get the SystemID for the system to be able to download the correct update.

$ sudo /usr/sbin/getSystemId

Download the latest BIOS “.HDR” file for this system. Go here: http://linux.dell.com/repo/firmware/bios-hdrs/. Scroll down the list to find a directory matching the System ID from the previous step. The directory will be named: system_bios_ven_0x1028_dev_SYSTEM_ID_version_BIOS_VERSION. Go into this directory and download the file, “bios.hdr”.

Load dell_rbu module.

$ sudo modprobe dell_rbu

Apply the BIOS update that you just downloaded.

$ sudo dellBiosUpdate -u -f ./bios.hdr

System should update and reboot.

 

2 Responses to “How To Update Dell Firmware on Fedora 20”

  1. Ray Holme says:

    I wish it worked – trying in fedora 22 – step 2

    # /usr/sbin/getSystemId
    ERROR: Could not parse system SMBIOS table.

    Common problems are:

    — Insufficient permissions to perform operation.
    Try running as a more privileged account.
    Linux : run as ‘root’ user
    Windows: run as ‘administrator’ user

    — dell_rbu or dcdbas device drivers not loaded.
    Try loading the dell_rbu driver
    Linux : modprobe dell_rbu
    Windows: dell_rbu driver not yet available.

    Could not find any modprobe, dell-rbu or dcdbas packages to download

    Wish it worked.

    • newlife007 says:

      I just did a fresh install of Fedora 22 Workstation on a Dell Latitude E6410 and ran sudo dnf -y install firmware-addon-dell and after the install I ran sudo /usr/sbin/getSystemId and got back results. Look in /usr/sbin and make sure getSystemId is there.

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