Poweredge r210 Freezes or Reboots when loading OS

I recently purchased a used Poweredge r210. It had windows 7 installed on a 2tb HDD (already wiped for security reasons). I immediately noticed that the server was way out of date in terms of firmware and BIOS - so I prioritized these first. Below are the things that I have tried.

1. Tried the Life Cycle controller update via FTP - Got an error that said there were no updates available. Did a quick google search and found out that 11G servers aren't supported anymore.

2. Tried downloading Dell Repository Manager on my laptop and exported a repository for network share. Transferred the files to my Ubuntu machine with Samba set up - I tried Life Cycle Controller update via Network share and unfortunately, due to my intricate firewall set up, the server could not find the network share so I just gave up.

3. Downloaded the Smart Bootable image for the r210, made a bootable USB out of it using Rufus, and tried booting the server to it - it fails mid way when loading the image. By fail I mean it either freezes or the server reboots.

4. Downloaded the 10GB SUU linux 32 bit and windows 32 bit ISOs as well as the Dell Live Support Image (Centos 7). I again made a bootable USB out of the Centos 7 iso and copied the contents of the SUUs to the directory of the bootable USB. I booted the server to the USB and it went as far as displaying the CentOS Desktop but again it froze while trying to run the ./suu via terminal. Each boot up I made to the live CentOS gave me less time to control until it freezes. It came to a point where I literally can't even load to the CentOS desktop anymore It just reboots after I choose it as my Boot drive in the BIOS set up.

5. I tried going back to the Life Cycle Controller update - this time via USB. My hunch was, since I have the repositories in the live CentOS USB, I could load the catalog and the DUPs. I was right. I managed to load the repositories and it gave me the list of updates I needed.

• The Bios was at version 1.5 and the latest one was at 1.10.
• The iDrac6 version was at 1.57 the current version is at 2.9.
• The Life Cycle Controller needed to be updated to 1.7.5

but when I clicked on next, it gave me an error saying that the packages are "not Dell Authorized" - did another quick google search and found out that idrac6 needs to be atleast 1.85 or newer and life cycle controller needs to be at least 1.5.2 for the update via USB to work. At this point I was ready to give up.

6. I tried downloading previous versions of the SUU packages as well as the Dell Live Support Image - still freezes or reboots upon loading.

7. I tried installing Ubuntu 18.04, Windows server 2012, Windows server 2008, and even inserted an SSD with Windows 7 installed but it always freezes or reboots when the OS is loading or immediately after it has loaded.

8. I finally saw a post on the Dell forums about a guy updating the BIOS via bootable DOS on a USB. I made a FreeDOS bootable USB and copied an unpackaged version of the BIOS update EXE file. IT WORKED!

I at least managed to update just the BIOS to the latest 1.12. but all other components are still out of date and I still can't install or load an OS for installation. I should also mention that only 2  40mm fans are currently working (1 for the power supply and directed towards the CPU heat sink) could this be a cooling issue caused by the lack of fans? I can run Life Cycle controller for hours on end without it freezing or rebooting though.