What are the iDRAC 7 default settings?

Question

My company has purchased a server in one of our foreign offices. As this office is very far away, management has asked me to set it up remotely, to save on travel costs.

The server (a PowerEdge T320) has a DRAC 7 enterprise, ordered at the same time as the system. I would like to ask one of the more tech-savvy users at this office to plug it in for me. I am confident he can do that, since it is just a matter of plugging in a few cables: however, I am not sure he would be that confortable navigating through BIOS screens.

My actual question is about what are the defaults of the iDRAC7 cards regarding IPv4 settings. Is DHCP automatically enabled by default? If so, it would be great, as I would just need to run an IP scan to discover the DRAC card and connect to it then using the default username and password (root / calvin).

Also, reading through the Dell iDRAC 7 manual to figure out the defaults (which doesn't really answer my questions), it says it needs to be accessed through the server's BIOS/UEFI rather than the usual Ctrl+E shortcut that I used on previous system. It might it was for previous generations of the card and that they are not integrated into the server's BIOS itself? So, I'm a bit confused...

I have never touched a T320 before, so I don't really know how things are on this system, and I would like to sound a bit certain, if I have to drive the user through the BIOS screens over the phone.

Also, the server is OS-less at the moment, as I would need to install that remotely through the DRAC's ISO-mounting feature, so unfortunately RACADM command-line utility is not an option (unless it can run fine through a BartPE disk, as I can access the server booted from such a disk remotely)

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

With an iDRAC7, the DRAC is on the motherboard and if you have an Enterprise license for it you get an add-on dedicated NIC for the DRAC.

Access to the DRAC is now integrated into the BIOS config interface, so at system boot, when prompted by the text in the upper righthand corner of the screen, press F2 (for System Setup). In System Setup, you should have a menu with three options: "System BIOS", "iDRAC Settings", and "Device Settings". Obviously, you want "iDRAC Settings".

In the iDRAC Settings, you get another menu with various sections. I'll just list all of the sections, their settings, and the settings' default values. I've checked both Express and Enterprise licensed iDRACS; where the defaults differ, I'll note both values.

I will show all default settings in bold if they can be changed and italics if they're present but greyed out (because a different setting has disabled them, usually). Informational settings will be in normal text.

• System Summary
  • No settings, but will show you which NIC the DRAC is using, as well as its network settings. If you just need someone to tell you what the network info is, send them here.
• Network
  • Network Settings
    • Enable NIC: Enabled
    • NIC Selection: Dedicated (Express is set to LOM1)
    • Failover Network: None (Express has this option enabled: None)
    • MAC Address: [varies, obviously]
    • Auto Negotiation: On (Express has this option disabled: On)
    • Auto Dedicated NIC: Disabled
    • Network Speed: [varies]
    • Active NIC Interface: Dedicated (Express has: None)
    • Duplex Mode: [varies]
  • Common Settings
    • Register DRAC on DNS: Disabled
    • DNS DRAC Name: idrac-XXXXXXX (Where XXXXXXX is the Dell Service Tag of the device)
    • Auto Config Domain Name: Disabled
    • Static DNS Domain Name: (empty)
  • IPv4 Settings
    • Enable IPv4: Enabled
    • Enable DHCP: Disabled
    • Static IP Address: 192.168.0.120
    • Static Gateway: 192.168.0.1
    • Static Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
    • Use DHCP to obtain DNS server addresses: Disabled
    • Static Preferred DNS Server: 0.0.0.0
    • Static Alternate DNS Server: 0.0.0.0
  • IPv6 Settings
    • Enable IPv6: Disabled
    • Enable Auto-configuration: Enabled
    • Static IP Address 1: ::
    • Static Prefex Length: 64
    • Static Gateway: ::
    • Link Local Address: ::
    • Use DHCP to obtain DNS Server address: Disabled
    • Static Preferred DNS Server: ::
    • Static Alternate DNS Server: ::
  • IPMI Settings
    • Enable IPMI Over LAN: Disabled
    • Channel Privilege Level Limit: Administrator
    • Encryption Key: 00000000000000000000000000000000
  • VLAN Settings
    • Enable VLAN ID: Disabled
    • VLAN ID: 1
    • Priority: 0
• OS to iDRAC Pass Through
  • OS to iDRAC Pass Through: Disabled
  • Network Settings
    • OS IP Address: 0.0.0.0
• Alerts
  • Platform Events
    • Enable Platform Event Filter Alerts: Disabled
  • Trap Settings
    • IP Destination List
    • Enable Alert Destination 1: Disabled
    • Alert Destination 1: 0.0.0.0
    • (This repeats for Alert Destinations 2 through 8)
    • Community String
    • Community String: public
• System Event Log
  • Total Number of Records: [varies]
  • Clear Records: No
• Virtual Media (Entire section is Enterprise-only)
  • Virtual Media Status: Auto attach
• vFlash Media (Entire section is Enterprise-only)
  • Enable vFlash: Enabled
• Power Configuration
  • Power Cap Policy (This subsection is Enterprise-only)
    • iDRAC Power Limit Policy: Disabled
    • Recommended Limits
    • Minimum Power Limit: 225 Watts or 767 BTU/hr
    • Maximum Power Limit: 294 Watts or 1003 BTU/hr
    • User Defined Limits
    • Maximum Power Limit (Watts): 277
    • Maximum Power Limit (BTU/hr): 945
    • Maximum % of Recommended System Limit: 75
  • Power Supply Options
    • Power Supply Redundant Policy: Power Supply Redundancy
  • Hot Spare
    • Enable Hot Spare: Enabled
    • Primary Power Supply Unit: PSU1
  • Power Factor Correction (PFC)
    • Enable Power Factor Correction: Disabled
• Thermal
  • Thermal Base Algorithm: Auto
  • User option: Default
  • Maximum Air Exhaust Temperature (in C): None
  • Fan Speed Offset: Low Fan Speed Offset
• System Location [I don't know how much of this a tower system will have.]
  • Data Center Name: (empty)
  • Aisle Name: (empty)
  • Rack Name: (empty)
  • Rack Slot: 1
  • Size of Managed System in U: [varies]
• Front Panel Security
  • Disable Power Button: No
  • Front Panel Access: Full Capabilities
  • Set LCD message: Service Tag
  • User-Defined String: (empty)
  • System Power Units: Watt
  • Ambient Temp Units: Celsius
  • Error Display: Simple
  • Enable Virtual Console Indication: Disabled
• User Configuration
  • User ID: 2
  • Enable User: Enabled
  • User Name: root
  • LAN User Privilege: Administrator
  • Serial Port User Privilege: Administrator
  • Change Password: [The default password is "calvin"]
• Smart Card (Entire section is Enterprise-only)
  • Configure Smart Card Logon: Disabled
• Lifecycle Controller
  • Lifecycle Controller: Enabled
  • Collect System Inventory on Restart: Enabled
  • Cancel Lifecycle Controller Actions: No
• Remote Enablement
  • Enable Auto-Discovery: Disabled
  • Provisioning Server: (empty)