So after upgrading my Windows box to Windows 7 and IE8 I lost the ability to use the remote console in my DRAC 5.
The DRAC is connected to a Dell R300 server, not that I need to use it much but recently my datacenter forced new IP addresses on me so I needed access to the remote console. It was then I found out that my version of the DRAC 1.31 that shipped with the machine was not compatible with IE8 and so the remote console did not work - I could view it ok, just not do anything with it.
I searched for an upgrade and found one that mentioned an IE8 compatibility fix here (firmware version 1.5.1)
Next came the how do I install it, I dont have a supported OS, I have Ubuntu; and I don't have racadm available - and there are a few versions to download. I'll cut this part of the story short, needless to say I did a fair bit of searching before ending up doing what I did.
Here is what I ended up doing (disclaimer, if it doesnt work for you, unlucky, I am not reponsible, and you should have a copy of your current working firmware version handy just in case. If it does work, beer is the international currency of choice)
- Download the executable archive file 'f_drac5c151_A00.exe' to my Windows machine and running it extracted a single file 'firmimg.d5' .
- Logged into my DRAC 5, clicked on remote administration link, then 'Update' tab.
- Update tab asks you to browse for firmware file, so point it to 'firmimg.d5' and click 'Update'
It took about 10/15 mins (I made a cup of tea so wasnt around when it completed) to upload and perform the firmware update. When I got back to the screen I had a popup message saying 'Update failed, click here to close window and log in again' (or similar).
So I logged in again and to my surprise I noticed the Firmware Version now said 1.51. I tried out remote console, it failed to login saying 'address already in use' or something like that. I googled around and saw others had the same issue. However this new firmware now had JNDi also, so I switched to the Java connection of remote console and it works perfectly!!
I now have a working remote console - I have still to get it to work with IE8 fully but for the moment that doesnt matter.