Updating Firmware on Samsung NVMe Drives from Linux

Posted Nov 28, 2025 Updated Nov 28, 2025

By Mikesco3

1 min read

Before We Begin

Introduction — Why This Matters

I ran into an issue where my Samsung NVMe Pro SSD would intermittently lock up under Proxmox. After some research, I discovered that outdated firmware can cause stability problems—and that Samsung provides a bootable firmware updater packaged in an ISO.

This guide walks through how to extract the firmware from Samsung’s ISO and update the drive directly from Linux, without needing to boot into a separate environment.

I was having an issue where my Samsung NVME Pro SSD was randomly locking up in proxmox. So in searching around I found the process for upgrading the NVME’s firmware from linux:

Overview of the Process:

Download the correct firmware ISO from Samsung.
Mount and extract the firmware payload.
Run the upgrade tool.
Shut down and boot back up.

Important Safety Notes

A word of Caution :
Do not blindly copy and paste these commands. Always verify:
You have the correct firmware for your exact SSD model.
The device path you flash is correct.
You have backups in case something goes wrong.
This guide is not a simple “copy/paste and hope” set of commands.

Step-by-Step Instructions:

1. Download the firmware ISO

Go to Samsung’s official support site and download the firmware image for your specific model:

Samsung SSD Tools & Firmware:

(https://semiconductor.samsung.com/consumer-storage/support/tools/

(Example below uses the Samsung 990 Pro firmware ISO.)

wget https://download.semiconductor.samsung.com/resources/software-resources/Samsung_SSD_990_PRO_7B2QJXD7.iso

2. Install required tools

apt-get -y install gzip unzip wget cpio

3. Mount the ISO

  
mkdir /mnt/iso
sudo mount -o loop ./Samsung_SSD_990_PRO_7B2QJXD7.iso /mnt/iso/

4. Extract the firmware payload

  
mkdir /tmp/fwupdate
cd /tmp/fwupdate

# Extract the initrd from the ISO
gzip -dc /mnt/iso/initrd | cpio -idv --no-absolute-filenames

5. Upgrade the firmware

cd /tmp/fwupdate/root/fumagician/
sudo ./fumagician

Sources:

Blogging, Tutorial

This post is licensed under CC BY 4.0 by the author.