Gigabyte R162-Z12-CD/MZ12-HD4 - No picture or USB after BIOS upgrade

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vteronen

New Member
Dec 30, 2025
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Hello,

So long story short: I might have bricked a Gigabyte server (R162-Z12-CD) after a BIOS and BMC upgrade.

I have multiple of these units and one of them didn't take too kindly to BIOS being updated.
There's currently no picture or USB doesn't power up if I try to use the server onsite. If I try to connect through BMC I just get a black screen and no response to any keystrokes.

From the BMC side I can see that the BIOS is still the same "R15-sig" and CPLD Firmware Information show N/A whereas functioning servers show something else for the CPLD firmware.

1767133955188.png

I have tried resetting BIOS, removing CMOS battery, physically removing power cords etc. basic stuff. No help.
I have tried reflashing the BIOS through BMC (actually multiple different ones) but they don't overwrite R15-sig.
Tried also reflashing the same BMC firmware but that didn't change things and the CPLD firmware available from Gigabyte site fails installing through BMC.

Under FRU information I have the following information:

1767134531003.png

Basically relevant stuff:
Board information: MZ12-HD4-CD
Product Name: R162-Z12-CD

Now from Gigabyte support site I can't actually find R162-Z12 model or MZ12-HD4 Motherboard. There are a lot of similar platforms with different Bios version etc. but I can't specifically find ther Z12 or HD4 models and that's probably the issue I am facing.

Does anyone have any pointers or suggestions on howto salvage this server?
 
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RolloZ170

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Apr 24, 2016
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this is OEM motherboard, where you got the BIOS from ?
have you made a dump (in BMCWebGUI) before BIOS update ?
 
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vteronen

New Member
Dec 30, 2025
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RolloZ170 said:
this is OEM motherboard, where you got the BIOS from ?
have you made a dump (in BMCWebGUI) before BIOS update ?
Click to expand...

On the affected server no, But I do have second server working with similar MB and HW designation so I can dump from there.
The problem is that the server dumps a .bin file so I can't flash that through BMC since the GUI only accepts .RBU for BIOS.Also since I can't get picture or POST I can't try booting from USB / virtual CD so it's a bit hard to use :F

As for Bios files the earlier upgrades were from https://www.gigabyte.com/Enterprise/Rack-Server/R162-Z11-rev-100#Support-BIOS
 
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RolloZ170

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SimpleOrc

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Mar 3, 2026
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I see a couple of these on my local fb marketplace, can anyone tell me if these servers support sr-iov and/or resizeable-bar/Smart access memory?
 
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SimpleOrc

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Mar 3, 2026
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RolloZ170 said:
sr-iov yes but disabled by default.
i found no rebar or sam options but i can be added this way.
Click to expand...

oof I have a cisco ucs c240 m5 lff, I was trying to use that dxe bios mod but I kept getting stuck. the bios.cap from cisco website doesnt work with either mmtool or ufeitool

its either find something else thats reasonably priced or try to find another way to modify the cap file
 
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RolloZ170

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Apr 24, 2016
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SimpleOrc said:
the bios.cap from cisco website doesnt work with either mmtool or ufeitool
Click to expand...
open with HxD (or other hex editor)
remove the first 800 hex (2048) bytes, this is CIMC header.
save and rename file to bios.zip
unzip with 7z to folder.
open bios file from folder in HxD again. remove 10D8 hex bytes header, save 2000000 hex bytes.
now you have flashable bin file for UEFITool and SPI flasher.
to rebuild the bios to a bios.cap need knowlege of checksums etc.
flash BIOS with clamp or replace BIOS chip with socket.
c240 m5 bios.jpg
 
Last edited:
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SimpleOrc

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Mar 3, 2026
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RolloZ170 said:
open with HxD (or other hex editor)
remove the first 800 hex (2048) bytes, this is CIMC header.
save and rename file to bios.zip
unzip with 7z to folder.
open bios file from folder in HxD again. remove 10D8 hex bytes header, save 2000000 hex bytes.
now you have flashable bin file for UEFITool and SPI flasher.
to rebuild the bios to a bios.cap need knowlege of checksums etc.
flash BIOS with clamp or replace BIOS chip with socket.
View attachment 47903
Click to expand...
:0 ive got a t48 coming in the mail thursday, but this gives me hope. thank you very much <3
if I am successful I will reply here and make another thread with the steps I took to install the dxe mod <33
 
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SimpleOrc

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Mar 3, 2026
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Just an update, I tried to pull bios from the chip but I think im going to have to desolder the bios chip. the tg48 doesn't recognize the chip, I think it might be a power issue or my soic16 clamp I paid for is dookie.

was reading ID as FF FF FF, after some fiddling with the clamp pins its reading everything as 00 00 00. thought I might of bricked the bios but, put it back together and, well its working fine. booted fine and im back into proxmox at the moment.

next step is ordering a smaller head for my iron so I can take the chip off. so, have no fear I'll ethier brick this baby or get resizable bar, I really want to use sriov with my b50 :/
 
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SimpleOrc

New Member
Mar 3, 2026
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RolloZ170 said:
can you dump the BIOS in BMCWebGUI firmware update page ?
you can work with that. after mod. add the RBU footer.


use hot air gun, shield around the chip with self adhesive copper foil(cheap from AZ e.g.)
Click to expand...
the cimc only has 2 options, I can update/activate via the cimc but there's no option to pull or dump that I can see.
Im hoping that if I can pull the bios off the chip it'll let me modify it with either mmtool or UEFItool, so eta to next update is probably 4 days-ish
 
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