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I am trying to get Samsung magican DC to work on my linux (linux mint 17 xfce) computer. I downloaded samsung magician dc from here. Then I downloaded the firmware update files from this page (under "Samsung SSD Firmware Updates for Windows Users", the 840 pro zip file).

Next I tried to follow the instructions in the Samsung magician dc user manual to install the firmware. First I need to figure out the disk number for the disk I want to update. This can be done with the following command:

brian@brian-desktop ~/Desktop/utilities/ssd/samsung_magician_dc-v1.0_rtm_p2/64bin $ sudo ./magician  -L
================================================================================================
Samsung(R) SSD Magician DC Version 1.0
Copyright (c) 2014 Samsung Corporation
================================================================================================
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Disk   | Model                     | Serial         | Firmware  | Capacity | Drive  | Total Bytes |
| Number |                           | Number         |           |          | Health | Written     |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| *0     |Samsung SSD 840 PRO Series |S1ATNSAD780426K |DXM05B0Q   | 238 GB   | GOOD   | 1.62 TB     |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From here we can see that my 840 pro has the disk number 0. Also the firmware is out of date because my version is DXM05B0Q, and the latest version is DXM06B0Q. So I went on to install the firmware I downloaded.

The following happens:

brian@brian-desktop ~/Desktop/utilities/ssd/samsung_magician_dc-v1.0_rtm_p2/64bin $ sudo ./magician -d 0 -F -p fw/
================================================================================================
Samsung(R) SSD Magician DC Version 1.0
Copyright (c) 2014 Samsung Corporation
================================================================================================
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WARNING :Please Note that Firmware Upgrade may format the disk and you will loose your data.
Please Ensure that data backup is taken before proceeding to Firmware Upgrade.
if you are sure then only proceed, otherwise restart the application after taking a backup.
Continue Firmware Upgrade ? [ yes ]:yes
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Disk Number:  *0 | Model Name: Samsung SSD 840 PRO Series | Firmware Version: DXM05B0Q
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
F/W Update:  [ERROR] The Firmware provided is empty or There is no Firmware in the specified path.  
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So I get an error saying that "The Firmware provided is empty or There is no Firmware in the specified path.", but I wanted it to update my firmware. My question is, "How do I make Samsung magician dc update my firmware?"

One guess I had was that maybe the windows firmware update I downloaded only works with windows, but if you download the .iso instead of the .zip, then the .iso you download for windows is the same as the .iso you download for mac (there is no .zip for mac on their page). This makes me think the firmware files are platform independent.

Another guess was that in the manual it only lists Ubuntu 12.04 as being supported while my operating system (linux mint 17 xfce) is based off of Ubuntu 14.04. I don't think this would really be a problem though.

A third possibility is that it is a problem that my ssd is mounted into my root partition at the time I try to apply the firmware update. The manual doesn't say whether or not this is allowed, but if it isn't, I don't see why it would give the error it does.

Supplementary information

Here is some information about my operating system:

brian@brian-desktop ~/Desktop/utilities/ssd/samsung_magician_dc-v1.0_rtm_p2/64bin $ uname -a
Linux brian-desktop 3.13.0-24-generic #47-Ubuntu SMP Fri May 2 23:30:00 UTC 2014 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

The sha1 hash for the magician executable:

brian@brian-desktop ~/Desktop/utilities/ssd/samsung_magician_dc-v1.0_rtm_p2/64bin $ sha1sum magician 
c80bc8f09b39f2edbaf4b97a345897a00cd6e38e  magician

The sha1 hash for the contents of the firmware update folder fw/

brian@brian-desktop ~/Desktop/utilities/ssd/samsung_magician_dc-v1.0_rtm_p2/64bin $ sha1sum fw/*
0ca38f0e078556259e43c3987a26acd2441d62b4  fw/DSRD.enc
fa4194fade9d51f72d98a363427febea57acc6c4  fw/DXM06B0Q.enc
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2 Answers 2

2

Using the instructions here, the solution to this problem (which I had as well) is to create the folder structure FW/DXM06B0Q and move the DXM06B0Q.enc file in there. As explained in the link I mentioned, the structure should look like this:

.../dsrdenc/DSRD.enc
.../dsrdenc/FW/FIRMWARE_NAME/FIRMWARE_NAME.enc

Why Samsung doesn't prepare the zip directly with the correct structure for their own tool is beyond me.

In any case, this will probably not get you much further, since it does seems the firmware update cannot be performed if your system is booted from the SSD, or at least that's what my best guess is seeing the (new) error message:

================================================================================================
Samsung(R) SSD Magician DC Version 1.0
Copyright (c) 2014 Samsung Corporation
================================================================================================
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WARNING :Please Note that Firmware Upgrade may format the disk and you will loose your data.
Please Ensure that data backup is taken before proceeding to Firmware Upgrade.
if you are sure then only proceed, otherwise restart the application after taking a backup.
Continue Firmware Upgrade ? [ yes ]:yes
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Disk Number:  *0 | Model Name: Samsung SSD 840 PRO Series | Firmware Version: DXM05B0Q
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
F/W Update:  [ERROR] Firmware Update Failed Due to a failure in device interaction.  
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Update: in fact it seems that the firmware update is successful, despite the error message.

2
  • Thanks this worked for me. I got the exact same error, and when I immediately checked the firmware version, it hadn't changed. But then I restarted my computer, and checked the firmware version again, and the version did change to the new one. Jan 5, 2015 at 1:39
  • Also I should say that the "FW" in the path does really need to be capitalized otherwise it won't find the firmware. Jan 5, 2015 at 1:43
3

This process worked for me (Dec '15) updating the firmware of a 840 PRO from DXM04B0Q to DXM06B0Q

  1. Download samsung_magician_dc-v1.0_rtm_p2.tar.gz from OP's first link.
  2. Unpack, cd to the relevant directory and run magician -L to list your drive:

    ~/samsung_magician_dc-v1.0_rtm_p2/64bin # ./magician -L
    =============================================================================================
    Samsung(R) SSD Magician DC Version 1.0
    Copyright (c) 2014 Samsung Corporation
    ================================================================================================
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | Disk   | Model                     | Serial         | Firmware  | Capacity | Drive  | Total Bytes |
    | Number |                           | Number         |           |          | Health | Written     |
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    | 1      |Samsung SSD 840 PRO Series |S12SNEAD118417H |DXM04B0Q   | 476 GB   | GOOD   | 62.01 TB    |
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    

    Note, this is magician v1. I tried magician v2 from the 'Data Center' section of the downloads page (www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/minisite/SSD/us/html/support/downloads.html), but ./magician -L couldn't find my disk.

  3. Download the Windows 'Samsung Magician Software for PC' ISO from the above download site (www.samsung.com/global/business/semiconductor/minisite/SSD/us/html/support/downloads.html).
  4. Mount the Windows ISO and the .img it contains with:

    mount -o loop ~/Downloads/Samsung_SSD_840_PRO_Series_DXM06B0Q_Win_Mac.iso /mnt
    mkdir /tmp/btdsk
    mount -o loop /mnt/isolinux/btdsk.img /tmp/btdsk
    
  5. Upgrade the firmware. In my case the disk is disk 1, so I use:

    ~/samsung_magician_dc-v1.0_rtm_p2/64bin # ./magician --disk 1 --firmware-update \
      --fwpackage-path /tmp/btdsk/samsung/DSRD/
    

    I then got the same error as bdumitriu: F/W Update: [ERROR] Firmware Update Failed Due to a failure in device interaction..

  6. Do a hard power-off, power-on. A reboot is not sufficient (in my experience).
  7. Run magician -L, which should report the new firmware. If not, check /usr/local/Magician/LoggerFiles/Logger_0.txt, which magician writes to.
3
  • Out of curiousity, do you see any advantages of disadvantages of doing it this way vs the way of the first answer? Dec 29, 2015 at 15:06
  • The first answer (by bdumitriu) references a reddit thread. My answer condenses the reddit info, plus bdumitriu's useful observations. It also indirectly addresses bdumitriu's complaint "Why Samsung doesn't prepare the zip directly with the correct structure for their own tool is beyond me." - the answer is, the structure is correct within btdsk.img.
    – amniarix
    Dec 31, 2015 at 23:38
  • v2 is only for "enterprise SSDs". The currently most likely working tool is not magician but "Samsung SSD Toolkit for Data center"
    – PlasmaHH
    Jul 19, 2019 at 8:24

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