How's your Firmware?

No, it’s not a rude question, in the world of computers, networks, and servers it is a very important question. Firmware is very base level of software that makes sure your network card operates, or your router routes traffic. Firmware ironically, is software. Its software that sits directly on the silicon chips in each piece of hardware and is how the hardware talks to Windows or any other operating system. The hardware manufacturers write the firmware to allow for their chips and circuits to be used by the rest of the computer.

Because firmware, is actually software it can have bugs or problems that need to be patched, so hardware makers issue firmware updates. These updates are less frequent than the ones for Windows or other software, but are as important if not more important, because they impact they way the computer’s hardware talks to everything else in the computer.

Firmware updates can do many things; plug critical security flaws, most often they boost performance, or patch a bug that could cause hardware to fail.
If Windows patches are like the oil changes every 5,000 miles for your car, then firmware updates are like the services done at 20,000 or 30,000 miles. They are necessary and important and represent good care and maintenance of key components in your network.

So, when was the last time you had your firmware updated?