Hi, You can shut down the server and the port when you do the update, but it shouldn’t be needed, once the update happens reload the switch and there will just be the momentary drop of connection while the switch boots, so it depends on your applications and if they can handle that.   
There are TWO switches being used, NOT TRUNKED together, but LAGed together at the CISCO NEXUS switch. The switch in slot A2 is running fine with each M620 blade using dual 10Gb daughter cards for the NIC's. We have 11 M620 blades running Linux and Windows applications in the M1000 enclosure. The switch is HOT swappable, but will require some minor FW updates and the LACP configuration for this specific switch to be updated upon insertion into the M1000. Does anyone know if any gotchas with this process? Should I stop all servers if possible? Can I 'offline' this A1 port of something while I do the FW updates and configuration or something like that then bring this online? Thanks in advance for any help, tips, etc.
Powerconnect M8024-k switch failed as primary switch in M1000e module group A1.