Pre-Deployment Checklist

Most NVIDIA Mission Control deployment sites are air-gapped and have no outbound internet access. All required software, firmware, and license artifacts must be downloaded and prepared on an internet-connected machine before arriving on-site.

Complete every item in this checklist before beginning the BCM installation. Attempting to resolve missing items on-site will cause significant delays.

Table 1 Pre-Deployment Checklist

✓	Item	Source
	BCM 11 ISO (x86_64 and aarch64/arm64 — both required for GB200/GB300 mixed-architecture deployments). Verify the MD5 checksum after download.	BCM Download Portal
	DGX OS / Base OS image for compute and control plane nodes (required for mixed-architecture deployments with ARM compute trays).	NVIDIA Licensing Portal (NLP) → Software Downloads
	BCM product key / license generated and activated (or CSR prepared for offline activation). See the licensing note in BCM Software Installation for air-gapped activation options.	NVIDIA Licensing Portal (NLP) → Base Command Manager
	Control plane node firmware (network adapters, OEM BIOS/UEFI). Download firmware packages for each control plane server model in use.	OEM vendor portal (Dell, Supermicro, etc.)
	N/S switch configurations and firmware validated and packaged (bcm-netautogen output or manual JSON device definitions, Cumulus image).	Internal — generated pre-site
	OOB switch firmware and configuration artifacts (Cumulus image, JSON device definitions for BCM import).	Internal — generated pre-site
	bcm-spectrumx-plugin.deb (GB200/GB300 Spectrum-X deployments only).	NVIDIA Licensing Portal (NLP) → Software Downloads
	DOCA host packages (doca-host_*.deb, doca-spxc-cc-*.deb) for Spectrum-X compute host image integration.	NVIDIA Licensing Portal (NLP) → Software Downloads
	InfiniBand switch firmware (if IB switches are included in the BOM).	NVIDIA Licensing Portal (NLP) → Software Downloads
	UFM license file generated for the UFM appliance MAC address(es) (if UFM is included in the BOM).	NVIDIA Licensing Portal (NLP) → Network Entitlements
	NFS solution confirmed for /home and /cm/shared (required for BCM HA). Confirm share paths and credentials with the customer before arriving on-site.	Customer-provided
	SBOM reviewed — software and firmware versions identified and recorded for this deployment.	NVIDIA Mission Control Release Notes
	Remote access to cluster (VPN credentials, jump host, or crash cart access) confirmed and tested before travel.	Customer-provided

Note

The items above cover prerequisites for the BCM installation and rack bring-up phases documented in this guide. Additional software artifacts required for the NVIDIA Mission Control Kubernetes stack (NGC API key, AHR certificates, Run:ai credentials, Grafana helm charts, and so on) are covered in the pre-deployment section of the NVIDIA Mission Control Software Installation Guide.