I thought I would register an account here and post my findings since google has brough me to these forums many times in the past it was long overdue.
I had the same problems with my November batch having the hardware version not showing up and I've gone through the various suggestions provided.
I ended up flashing different versions of firmware but the one which is running right now is S9_V2.30 autotune. I originally had S9_V2.54 when the miner shipped to me but I couldn't find that firmware anywhere on the bitmain site.
I took the hashboards out to see if they needed to be cleaned or dusted but they were good for the most part. I dusted out what I could and put it back together. Still no good. I gave up and opened a ticket with bitmain thinking all was lost.
I then had an idea to try and start the miner with only the main board connected (the hashboards had power to them but were not connected to the main board) ... sure enough I was able to get the hardware version to show up.
I connected the hashboards to the main board and left it.. sure enough it started hashing again all back to normal.
something worth trying.
But removing hashboards voids warranty right?
not sure.. The bitmain site has instructions on how to do all of this stuff.. My second miner arrived yesterday with the same problem. I am really thinking that this is due to the temperature and when I say that I mean too cold to start rather than too hot.
I did nothing with the new miner except let it run and warm up. It tested itself for well over 1.5 hours before it finally started hashing.. I plugged it in 10 minutes after UPS delivered it and it was still very cold when taken out of the package, so it was likely sitting for a while allowing the electronics on the board to get very cold.