Crossflash Lenovo CX-4 to Stock Mellanox

[llowrey]

I recently received one of these:

Mellanox ConnectX-4 CX455A PCIe x16 3.0 100GBe EDR IB VPI QSFP28 MCX455A | eBay

It's running a Lenovo firmware and is stuck in IB mode. I'd like to flash it with stock Mellanox firmware.

The instructions I found here on crossflashing involve building a custom firmware but Mellanox no longer publishes the required files on their website. Am I out of luck? Or can I just flash the stock MCX455A-ECAT firmware with -allow_psid_change?

Details:

Product Name: CX455A - ConnectX-4 QSFP
Read-only fields:
        [PN] Part number: 00MW478
        [EC] Engineering changes: A1
        [SN] Serial number: 00MW478YK502065K00C
        [V0] Vendor specific: PCIeGen3 x16
        [RV] Reserved: checksum good, 0 byte(s) reserved

hca_id: mlx5_0
        transport:                      InfiniBand (0)
        fw_ver:                         12.100.6440
        node_guid:                      248a:0703:001e:0644
        sys_image_guid:                 248a:0703:001e:0644
        vendor_id:                      0x02c9
        vendor_part_id:                 4115
        hw_ver:                         0x0
        board_id:                       LNV2180110032
        phys_port_cnt:                  1
                port:   1
                        state:                  PORT_DOWN (1)
                        max_mtu:                4096 (5)
                        active_mtu:             4096 (5)
                        sm_lid:                 0
                        port_lid:               65535
                        port_lmc:               0x00
                        link_layer:             InfiniBand

Device #1:
----------

  Device Type:      ConnectX4
  Part Number:      00KH925_Ax
  Description:      Mellanox ConnectX-4 EDR IB VPI Single-port x16 PCIe 3.0 HCA
  PSID:             LNV2180110032
  PCI Device Name:  /dev/mst/mt4115_pciconf0
  Base GUID:        248a0703001e0644
  Base MAC:         248a071e0644
  Versions:         Current        Available
     FW             12.0100.6440   N/A

  Status:           No matching image found

# mlxconfig -d /dev/mst/mt4115_pciconf0  q

Device #1:
----------

Device type:    ConnectX4
Name:           N/A
Description:    N/A
Device:         /dev/mst/mt4115_pciconf0

Configurations:                              Next Boot
-E- Device doesn't support any configuration changes.

 

[fohdeesha]

just flash the stock CX455A image (back up the current fw on the card first). do you have a way of removing heat from that heat pipe system? I recall some other users on here having a bunch of issues with that

 

[llowrey]

Worked like a charm. I'm now running the stock MCX455A-ECAT firmware and am connecting at 40GbE. It won't link at 56GbE though. I'm not sure if the card should be able to or not. The datasheet is ambiguous. Anyway, my only goal is to do the best I can with an old PCIe2 system.

I'm going to replace the heatpipe assembly with a finned heatsink. I'm sure I've got something in the scrap pile I can salvage.

 

[llowrey]

I've been able to hit 38Gb/s with iperf (4 streams). That's a great result for PCIe2. While two x8 cards would have been cheaper, I only had a single x16 slot free so this was my best option. My single stream performance is only 21Gb/s so, performance wise, it would have been a wash.

 

[isaacwiebe]

This is one of the more recent threads with a successful cross flash, it looks like they removed allow_psid_change in the more recent versions of MFT...or am I missing something? Any tips?

 

[Eong]

I've been able to hit 38Gb/s with iperf (4 streams). That's a great result for PCIe2. While two x8 cards would have been cheaper, I only had a single x16 slot free so this was my best option. My single stream performance is only 21Gb/s so, performance wise, it would have been a wash.

I am having problem with the my mellanox x3 pro card on Windows 10. Upstream can reach 38Gbps but downstream only 12Gbps. May I ask which system are you using? Do you mind to test your x4 card on a windows 10 x64?
Thanks in advance.