Station-Driver is as always ahead of other driver pages, the page listed a new Intel Managment Engine firmware for Intel 300-Series chipsets and shows again that it’s worth supporting these guys behind it.
Intel CNP 300-series
The new Coffee-Lake chipsets for the consumer platform are listed here. Intel itself doesn’t or only rarely provides firmware updates for the chipsets, only if it’s requested or in case a security vulnerability appeared. The reason why Station-Driver is so valuable here is that it collects the things which are hard to find on official pages or like, in this case, are not even listed officially.
The firmware also comes with a little utility (needs administrative privileges in order to read special firmware sectors) called “MEInfoWin64” or for x86 systems “MEInfoWin” so you quickly can check which firmware is currently installed or get additional information on the ME firmware and installed drivers.
Warnings about Intel Management Engine (ME) Firmware v12
The CSME 12 firmware is only for 300 & C240-series systems which come with CSME 12 firmware. This means all 100/200/Z370/X299/C400/C620-series systems use CSME 11 firmware. Or in other words, there is no upgrade from CSME 11 to 12 unless you change the chipset.
Troubleshooting
In case you get update errors like e.g. communication error, check the article on Intel how to resolve it. If you want to reset the entire ME firmware you can start the integrated tool with “fptw -greset”, after that your system’s shutdown automatically and you can unplug the power for around 2 minutes, restart and flash another firmware.
The integrated flash utility checks normally if you firmware is compatible or not and in case it isn’t it abort the flashing process automatically unless you use a special command line parameter to disable this protection (e.g. in case you like to downgrade your firmware).
Usually, the firmware’s doesn’t include any changelog file or readme which shows the changelog, only in case Intel, HP etc providing some official informations.
Can you trust Station-Drivers and the people behind?
Definitely yes, it sounds suspicious that some firmware’s and drivers aren’t officially listed but it’s not, there people behind the platform e.g. from the win-raid.com forum, which modding or extracting and uploading the drivers for everyone on station-drivers in order to ensure everyone gets the ability to install the latest drivers. The benefit is simply that you can upload your original driver/firmware etc. in order to help others. Before the dumped files are extracted uploaded and shown it gets verified by several members in order to ensure that there not infected or manipulated. I’ve btw never seen any file ever provided by station-drivers or win-raid which where infected, the modified ones are usually well documented as much as possible.
Closing Words
The new firmware brings several minor changes and since Intel doesn’t offer something officially on their homepage you might want to upgrade your firmware, station-drivers/win-raid forum make that possible because they provide a package which comes with everything you need, a little utility which reads-out the current status and a flash utility which is easy to use. If there additional questions about the firmware then check-up the thread on win-raid forum which explains really everything when it comes to the ME firmware.
CK’s Technology News 
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