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cat pants
Asked: 2013-04-12 12:56:27 +0800 CST

Is it possible to change BIOS settings from Linux?

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I'm trying to write a script to enable IPMI on a ton of machines without having to hook up a KVM to them one by one. Is it possible to change the BIOS settings from Linux? OS is SL6.

I understand that each machine will likely need to be power cycled, but I can do that programmatically of course.

linux

3 Answers

  1. In general, no. There is no standard for how settings are stored, or even what settings there are. This information is proprietary to each individual bios.

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  2. Use:

    ... to Read

    • dmidecode (tool for dumping a computer's DMI (some say SMBIOS))

    ... to write

    • http://flashrom.org (tool for identifying, reading, writing, verifying and erasing flash chips....)

    • http://www.coreboot.org (is a Free Software project aimed at replacing the proprietary BIOS (firmware) found in most computers.)

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  3. On HPE servers you can change settings using utility called conrep. It's part of the hp-scripting-tools RPM. The usage is described here:

    h20566.www2.hpe.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?sp4ts.oid=5249594&docLocale=en_US&docId=emr_na-c05182235

    It's quite simple. With -s (save) parameter you say it to save the configuration, like:

    conrep -s -f BL460Gen8.dat

    And with -l (load) parameter you say it to load the configuration:

    conrep -l -f BL460Gen8.dat

    The dat file is actually XML code. So if you want for example enable/disable hyperthreading settings, find respective line and modify the value. See the example for G6 and newer generations:

    <Section name="Intel_Hyperthreading" helptext="Toggles hyperthreading on Intel based G6 and greater systems">Enabled</Section>
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