VMware ESXi 4.1 show’s Intel 82576 Gigabit NIC on Cisco UCS C210 M2 as 10Mbps Full

One of the reasons why I like what I do an my position at the company is that whenever there’s any problems with a Cisco UCS B or C series servers, I’m one of the few who always get the email, call or IM about it so here’s another one to add to all the other posts I have about the problems I’ve experienced:

Problem

I received an email from one of my colleagues about two of our Cisco UCS C210 M2 servers which are about to go live in a month are showing that the Intel Corporation 82576 Gigabit Network Connection NIC is connected at 10Mbps Full.  Here’s what it looks like via the VI Client:

Solution

So what solved it?  A simple firmware update on the UCS C210 M2 got ESXi 4.1 Build 260247 to show the NIC at the proper speed.  Now before I include more screenshots, I’d like to point out that I don’t think this problem was caused by an older firmware and the reason is because if that was the case, wouldn’t this have become a public Cisco KB?  My suspicion is more that somehow a mismatch of BIOS, CIMC and LOM firmware is what caused it.  I wasn’t the one who set up this server and I know an update was made to the CIMC but not the rest.  Here are the version I found prior to updating the firmware:

BIOS Version: C200.1.1.1.a.0 (Build Date: 03/29/2010)

CIMC Firmware:

Running Version: 1.2(1b)

Backup Version: 1.1(1d)

Boot-loader Version: 1.2(1b).6

Here’s another shot via the Host Based Upgrade boot CD:

BIOS: C200.1.1.1a.0.032920100525

CIMC firmware: 1.2(1b)

Once I saw the mismatch in firmware version, I went ahead and updated the firmware to:

CIMC Firmware: 1.2(2d)

BIOS: C200.1.2.2f.0

LOM: Not sure but it was updated

I’m not going into the details of how to update the firmware as I am supposed to write another post about it but just haven’t gone around to doing it.  Once I completed the firmware update, rebooted the server and had it boot back into ESXi 4.1, the NIC speed started to show up properly:

Before I end and publish this post, I’d like to reiterate that I highly doubt the problem was because of an old firmware and is most likely something else but if anyone ever runs into a problem similar to this, try updating the firmware (which is probably what Cisco Support would have told you if you had called them).