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"X" Series Firmware Update


Yellowbeard

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We are making a firmware update available on this forum for owners of Corsair X-Series SSDs. This update will enable the TRIM command within Windows 7 for drives with early firmware versions that do not currently support it. Before proceeding with this update, there are some EXTREMELY IMPORTANT items you need to be aware of.

 

Please read the following CAREFULLY:

 

1. THIS UPDATE TOOL IS PRELIMINARY. It is unable to pass our standard acceptance testing for customer use. It is being released due to strong customer demand ONLY. Use of this tool is supported by Corsair, but is NOT RECOMMENDED.

 

2. THIS UPDATE TOOL WILL NOT WORK WITH ALL SYSTEMS. Failures have been experienced during testing on various systems. If your system is unable to update the firmware on the drive, you can send the drive to Corsair to have it updated, as described below.

 

3. RUNNING THIS UPDATE MAY CAUSE PROBLEMS WITH YOUR DRIVE. We have observed instances on other vendors’ sites where firmware update has caused the drive to no longer be recognized by the system. In such cases, Corsair will update the drive, as described below.

 

4. CORSAIR WILL REPAIR OR REPLACE ANY DRIVES WHICH ARE NOT UPDATED SUCCESSFULLY. Any drives which are not updated successfully can be sent to Corsair for update. Note that in all circumstances this will result in COMPLETE ERASURE of the drive and a turnaround time of two to four weeks, including shipping. Details can be found here.

 

5. X-256 Owners: Firmware 1.1 ON X-256 DRIVES SUPPORTS TRIM AND DOES NOT NEED TO BE UPDATED TO HAVE TRIM SUPPORT! X-256 firmware 1.1 is the same as the 2.0 firmware on X128, X64, and X32. The 2.0 update adds no additional functionality or performance to the X-256 and therefore the drive should NOT be updated using this update. The update files for the X-256 have been removed.

 

Please continue reading below for information on determining if the firmware currently on your drive already supports TRIM, and instructions on how to update your drive should you choose to do so.

 

BACK UP YOUR DATA BEFORE ATTEMPTING TO UPDATE YOUR FIRMWARE

Steps to update your X-Series Firmware

 

1. Run CrystalDiskInfo, available HERE.

 

NOTE: If you see "2.0" as the current firmware, YOU DO NOT NEED TO RUN THIS FIRMWARE UPDATE AND ALREADY HAVE THE MOST RECENT FIRMWARE.

 

2. Determine if your drive has an upper case or lower case part number, as shown in this image.

 

http://www2.corsair.com/appslab/xseries/lowerupper.png

 

3. Download the appropriate firmware for your drive below.

 

UPPER CASE 256GB

UPPER CASE 128GB

UPPER CASE 64GB

UPPER CASE 32GB

 

lower case 256GB

lower case 128GB

lower case 64GB

lower case 32GB

 

4. Extract the .EXE file and copy it onto a bootable USB drive.

 

5. Reboot your computer and boot to the USB drive.

 

a. Some motherboards have boot selection screens you can access by hitting a key on boot, check your motherboard manual to see if your board can do this.

 

b. Otherwise, changing the boot order in the BIOS temporarily might be required.

 

6. The system should boot to a command prompt, like below:

 

http://www2.corsair.com/appslab/xseries/image01.jpg

 

7. Run the appropriate .EXE file by typing its name and hitting enter, ex: C:\>upper64.exe

 

8. The system will ask you to search for the drive. Hit the Y key for yes.

 

http://www2.corsair.com/appslab/xseries/image02.jpg

 

9. Once the system finds the drive, you’ll see a screen like this:

 

http://www2.corsair.com/appslab/xseries/image03.jpg

 

10. Hit the appropriate number of the drive you wish to update, then hit enter. The drive should be flashed at this point.

 

http://www2.corsair.com/appslab/xseries/image04.jpg

 

11. At this point, your drive should be flashed after a reboot.

 

ADDITIONAL TIPS POSTED BY RAM GUY

 

Reading through the posts and from my own experience these seem to be the keys to success. But no guarantee OK just what I noticed and some other observations and what I used in the lab that worked.

 

 

1. If you have them in a RAID you should to break the RAID and I would suggest using Parted Magic or G-Parted to secure erase the drives.

 

2. Make sure no TSR's are loaded when you boot to the USB Drive IE memory managers like himem.sys or EMM386.exe. And that you are using Windows 98 Second Edition to make the boot drive you can get these files from http://www.bootdisk.com.

 

3. If the drive is not detected try hot plugging the drive and another USB Port. This was what worked for me and many others who had successs. This is also mentioned when running the Secure erase software as the MB BIOS will sometimes lock the drive and hot plugging or moving to another port will unlock the MB BIOS.

 

4. If it fails on the MB or system you have it on try another system even if its an older system that only supports S-ATA1 it may work.

 

5. MB BIOS's are all different and some MB makers have better written BIOS than others and that can effect the outcome of this utility. Now please dont miss-understand I am not suggesting that one MB maker is better than another but I have seen MB's with different model numbers even from the same MB maker have better written BIOS than another model. A good clue to well written BIOS from a MB maker is not many BIOS updates and not many complaints about BIOS related issues, this requires some research on the MB or MB's in question. FYI! And in all fairness this utility is not what we would 100% stable as mentioned previously.

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  • 1 month later...

If you have firmware revision 2.0 or firmware revision 1.1 on X-256 installed, please disregard this post.

 

If you have problems flashing the drive and get errors like "Firmware flash failed" or "invalid drive" or something similar and you wish to send the drive to Corsair to have us flash it, please take note of the serial number on your drive.

 

PLEASE NOTE TO TAKE THE SERIAL NUMBER FROM THE STICKER, AND NOT FROM SOFTWARE

 

http://www2.corsair.com/appslab/xseries/serialnumber.jpg

 

Once you have this serial number, please go to our TSX program, located here:

http://www.corsair.com/support/helpdesk/

 

Follow the on-screen guide to get your RMA return number.

 

BEFORE SENDING YOUR DRIVE TO CORSAIR, PLEASE BACK UP ANY VALUABLE DATA AND THEN ERASE THE DRIVE

 

All drives sent to Corsair will be wiped before the firmware is flashed, and returned to you with no data on them.

 

For RMAs, anywhere in the world, use the link given in this thread.

 

Once you complete the RMA form, it will direct you to the closest shipping point.

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5. X-256 Owners: Firmware 1.1 ON X-256 DRIVES SUPPORTS TRIM AND DOES NOT NEED TO BE UPDATED TO HAVE TRIM SUPPORT! X-256 firmware 1.1 is the same as the 2.0 firmware on X128, X64, and X32. The 2.0 update adds no additional functionality or performance to the X-256 and therefore the drive should NOT be updated using this update. The update files for the X-256 have been removed.

 

I updated the info in the first post. One of our engineers passed this on to me yesterday.

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  • 1 year later...

Actually, the post says:

 

"The 2.0 update adds no additional functionality or performance to the X-256 and therefore the drive should NOT be updated using this update. The update files for the X-256 have been removed." (in fact they are still available)

 

It clearly says "should NOT be updated" :) Ok, I'll give it a try - after all, it says TRIM is not supported, and that would be nice under Lion. I hope you understand my confusion.

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  • 1 month later...
  • 1 year later...

Hi, I have two X64 drives, both purchased together at the same time, one has version 1.0 and the other has version 2.0 firmware and sods law I have Win7 loaded onto the one which doesn't support TRIM and the performance is beginning to stutter. I am also considering putting these drives into RAID0 and so you can see the need for the updated firmware.

 

I've just downloaded the Bootable Flash Drive tool which works perfectly, thanks Yellowbeard. I used it to boot to the command line so I could flash version 2.0 firmware onto one of my X64's. All was going well until I got to the bit where it asked if I wanted it to search for the drives at which point the keyboard failed to respond and wouldn't let me enter a value. Is that a known issue and is there a fix?

 

Anyway, a few attempts and some varied frantic hitting of keys I managed to get the flash utility to work on three or four occasions and accept the drive I wanted to update only for it to then tell me that the download failed 'Bye'.

 

I know this is an old thread and drive technology has moved on and I have read the thread but I may be missing something so could you please tell me if there is something else I can try to flash version 2.0 firmware onto this drive or whether I'm doing something wrong?

 

Can I flash the firmware using another computer by plugging my drive into a spare port, if so can you instruct me?

 

Thanks in advance for any help.

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could you please tell me if there is something else I can try to flash version 2.0 firmware onto this drive or whether I'm doing something wrong?

Flashing my corsair drive has literally been the biggest pain the backside in my entire computing usuage history.

 

You need to try on different SATA ports. And if you have tried all the ports then on another PC. Its the only thing you can do.

 

I tried mine on three separate PCs and none worked. I then sent it back to my retailer as they said they would try flashing it. They tried it on 10 separate PCs and multiple of SATA ports before they gave up and replaced my drive with a brand new one.

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Thanks for the reply Anth, I know a lot of people have had trouble with this particular issue and I was hoping I would never have to do it but its getting to the point that I either update the firmware or buy a new drive.

 

If I continue to fail I wonder if Corsair would still replace the drive if they failed to update it?? Hmmmm

 

Thanks again.

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  • 2 months later...

I have a corsair CMFssd-128 D1 lower case

 

 

http://imageshack.us/a/img441/7461/snapg.jpg

 

I have a problem ...

when The system ask me to search for the drive, I Hit the Y key for yes

but it does not find the drive :confused:

 

http://img546.imageshack.us/img546/4391/20130314170459.jpg

 

 

my configuration is: core i7 920 and asus p6td deluxe in ahci mode

 

 

 

 

 

.

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Copy/paste from the first topic : "If the drive is not detected try hot plugging the drive and another USB Port. This was what worked for me and many others who had successs. This is also mentioned when running the Secure erase software as the MB BIOS will sometimes lock the drive and hot plugging or moving to another port will unlock the MB BIOS."
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