3Com 5500G-EI firmware update failure - expansion board bootrom?

[LostedMan]

Hi all.  I have 10 3Com 5500G-EI switches, and I upgraded an XRN stack of them to E5500G_03.03.02p22 from E5500G_03.03.02p21.  They booted just fine, and the 10GB Xenpak module came up.  There was a link.  But, no actual traffic would traverse the link.  I downgraded back to E5500G_03.03.02p21, and it worked just fine.  Very strange.  I actually sat down and read the release notes, and one thing I had ignored jumped out at me. 

The same note on all releases going back a few years say that you have to have bootrom V240 for the expansion board.

A following note in the text says, "Don’t upgrade the boot ROM of the expansion card before the version higher than 220 is released."  What do I make of that?

Here is the "dis ver" from my switch.  They're all the same.

>dis ver
3Com Corporation
Switch 5500G-EI Software Version 3Com OS V3.03.02s168p21
Copyright (c) 2004-2012 3Com Corporation and its licensors, All rights reserved.
Switch 5500G-EI uptime is 0 week, 0 day, 0 hour, 32 minutes

Switch 5500G-EI PWR 48-Port with 1 Processor
128M    bytes SDRAM
16384K  bytes Flash Memory
Config Register points to FLASH

Hardware Version is REV.C
CPLD Version is 002
Bootrom Version is 5.05
[Subslot 0] 48GE+4SFP  Hardware Version is 00.00.00
[Subslot 1] 1 Xenpak Hardware Version is REV.D
            CPLD Version is 002
            Bootrom Version is 220
[Subslot 2] 2 STACK Hardware Version is REV.C

So, I've been upgrading all these years against what the release notes say, but it hasn't been an issue up til now.  Is that what made it stop working?  I can't find any bootrom updates out there for this expansion board (JE077a/JC17261).  Any ideas?

TIA,

Brian

[Apachez-]

I guess this question is something for the HP support to answer. Dont forget to add their answer to this thread.

Edit: By the way I have seen recent firmware updates has the bootrom updates included within the firmware itself instead of a specific file. This way the firmware update will automagically update the bootrom if needed. But I dunno if this is true for addon cards (the bootrom Im thinking of is the bootrom of the device itself).