Samsung SSD 990 Pro Firmware Update

Estimated reading time at 200 wpm: 5 minutes

Many people including me have had their Samsung 990 Pro 2TB stuck on firmware version 3B2QJXD7. Attempts to update via Samsung Magician fail miserably. But not only the 990 drive has been affected. Samsung has never fixed this via Magician. The latest firmware for the 990 is 8B2QJXD7 (December 2025). It addresses read-operation stability and incorporates all previous fixes including the intermittent non-recognition and blue screen issue (7B2QJXD7, September 2025) and high temperature logging (4B2QJXD7, December 2024).

The root cause of Magician’s failure was discovered by the online community of geeks to be the Intel VMD (Volume Management Device) being enabled in BIOS. This prevents Magician from communicating properly with the drive. The fix was to update via a bootable USB ISO instead.

Drive Details

Firmware History (990 Pro Series)

Tools Required

• Rufus 4.14 — bootable USB creation tool
• Samsung SSD 990 PRO Firmware ISO — Samsung_SSD_990_PRO_8B2QJXD7.iso (50MB)
• USB stick — 32GB Kingston DataTraveler used
• Firmware ISO source: https://semiconductor.samsung.com/consumer-storage/support/tools/

Step 1 — Download the firmware ISO

1. Go to https://semiconductor.samsung.com/consumer-storage/support/tools/
2. Locate NVMe SSD-990 PRO Series Firmware under Samsung Storage Firmware
3. Download the ISO (8B2QJXD7 · 50MB) and save to D:\Downloads or similar

Step 2 — Create bootable USB with Rufus

1. Insert USB stick and open Rufus
2. Set Device to the USB stick
3. Click Select and browse to the downloaded ISO
4. Leave all other settings as default:
   • Partition scheme: MBR
   • Target system: BIOS or UEFI
   • File system: FAT32
5. Click Start
6. When prompted about ISOHybrid image — select Write in ISO Image mode (Recommended) → OK
7. When prompted about Grub 2.06-samsung version mismatch — click Yes to download matching file
8. When prompted about Syslinux version mismatch — click Yes to download matching files
9. Wait for Rufus to complete

Step 3 — BIOS configuration

Restart the PC and press Delete to enter BIOS. Press F7 for Advanced Mode. Don’t be an idiot – BIOSes can vary so I can’t know what will work for your BIOS or computer.

Disable VMD controller

1. Go to Advanced → System Agent (SA) Configuration → VMD setup menu
2. Set Enable VMD controller to Disabled
3. Note: a data loss warning appears — this is generic. In this system, Map PCIE Storage under VMD and Map SATA Controller under VMD were both already Disabled, meaning drives were not actively under VMD control. The warning did not apply.

Secure Boot

1. Go to Boot → Secure Boot
2. OS Type was already set to Other OS — this effectively disables Secure Boot enforcement on ASUS boards. No further change was needed.

Set boot priority

The Kingston USB appeared as Boot Option #4 — UEFI: KingstonDataTraveler 3.0PMAP, Partition 1. This was sufficient — no need to change boot order permanently.

Step 4 — Boot from USB and update

1. Press F10 to save BIOS changes and exit
2. At restart, press F8 to open the boot menu
3. Select the Kingston USB (UEFI entry)
4. The Samsung SSD Firmware Update Utility Ver. 3.1 loads
5. Read the warning (do not power off during update) and press any key to continue
6. The utility detects the drive and displays:
   • Drive: 1
   • Model: Samsung SSD 990 PRO 2TB
   • Firmware Version: 3B2QJXD7
7. Type Y to proceed
8. A second warning about data backup appears — type Y again
9. The update runs and completes
10. Press any key to exit the utility
11. The PC restarts normally

Step 5 — Restore BIOS settings

Re-enter BIOS after the update and restore VMD settings:

1. Go to Advanced → System Agent (SA) Configuration → VMD setup menu
2. Re-enable Enable VMD controller
3. Note: enabling Intel RST (visible in EZ Mode) automatically enables Map PCIE Storage under VMD and Map SATA Controller under VMD. This differs from the pre-update state where both were Disabled. The system booted and ran stably with these settings enabled.
4. Press F10 to save and exit

Step 6 — Verify firmware version

Boot into Windows and run in PowerShell:

Get-PhysicalDisk | Select-Object FriendlyName, MediaType, FirmwareVersion

Expected output and result

FriendlyName                 MediaType   FirmwareVersion
------------                 ---------   ---------------
NVMe Samsung SSD 990 PRO 2TB SSD         8B2QJXD7
Kingston DataTraveler 3.0    Unspecified PMAP
NVMe Samsung SSD 980 1TB     SSD         3B4QFXO7

Firmware 8B2QJXD7 confirmed. Update successful.

Post-update note — Samsung Magician chkdsk warning

After installing Samsung Magician, the Over Provisioning tab showed a “Volume may be corrupted — use chkdsk” warning for Drive D. This is likely related to the BIOS VMD configuration change. The drive health status showed Good and temperature was normal (43°C). A chkdsk D: /f was scheduled to run at next restart. That’s unlikely to show errors – and on my system none showed. Over Provisioning then worked like a nice dream.

Key lessons

• Samsung Magician cannot update 990 Pro firmware when Intel VMD is enabled in BIOS, even if Map PCIE and Map SATA are not active under VMD.
• The bootable USB ISO method is reliable and bypasses VMD entirely.
• Disabling VMD is safe when Map PCIE Storage and Map SATA Controller under VMD are both already Disabled — the drives are not under VMD control in that configuration.
• After the update, re-enabling Intel RST may automatically enable the Map settings. Monitor system stability.
• Samsung 980 1TB (Drive D, BigLinux partition host) was not updated — a separate firmware ISO would be needed for that model.