I wish I had foresight sometimes. I won’t say this is the only reason, but I basically flew across the country because I could not get into a DRAC (Dell Remote Access Card) for a server I manage. I just came across this (article)[https://www.ispcolohost.com/2020/04/06/resetting-a-dell-idrac-password-from-inside-vsphere-esxi/] detailing how to use the racadm command from the ESX shell, which would have saved me significant time and effort.

I am working on updating documentation right now, and part of that process is making sure I have access to everything I say I have access to. Most stuff is fine, but I came across that one problem-child server that won’t let me into the DRAC with any of the passwords I have written down. Damn. I was able to follow the steps in this article easily (and didn’t have to force a reboot like he did) and was able to reset the DRAC password. Awesome!

(Download Dell EMC iDRAC Tools for ESXi)[https://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=jywk1&oscode=xi65&productcode=poweredge-r720]

  • SFTP them to your server (I couldn’t wget in this case, no default gateway set)
  • Untar them (I did in the /tmp folder)
  • esxcli software vib install -d /tmp/iDRACTools/racadm/ESXi65/Racadm-Dell-EMC-Web-9.3.0-33 79.VIB-ESX65i.zip
    • Change the filename to whatever version yours is