Dell R440 LCC Firmware Update

Shiny new R440's turn up on site - and you know what Dell - I may hate your DellEMC logo with a passion - but your new boxes look GREAT, well thought out too. A colleague calls me through as they are trying and failing to update the firmware before deploying the machine. An easy way to ensure everything is up to speed, and a convenient feature of the lifecycle controller. It was sat there for a great deal of time then failing. Which was distinctly sub-optimal.

The FTP server in the Firmware Update section of the LCC (Life Cycle Controller) had been pre-populated with download.dell.com .

The usual setting for the FTP server field is blank - and you just type in ftp.dell.com .

At the back of my mind was "maybe they have changed the server, and this new hardware comes from another FTP server?" ... but no. Sure enough, resolves, connects, downloads catalogue - shows you what needs updating, and moves on from there at a pace you would expect when updating firmware - 'measure twice cut once' and all that.

The LCC comes pre-populated by a default FTP server (we have apparently moved on from not having anything in that field) with the wrong server name altogether. Clearly a Friday afternoon QC/QA job for the BIOS. Come on Dell, while you are no (and will never be an) IBM or HP/Compaq you are better than this!

Small fix, worthy of comment.