This was a problem with the initial release of the Dell Support Center 2.0 late last year but supposedly it's been fixed - see this thread:

http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=si_newusers&message.id=91284&query.id=135842#M91284

This might also help, though I think this was also fixed a good while ago. 

http://windowsxp.mvps.org/dellfolder.htm

Thanks!!! I haven't gotten to the client machine yet, but I have a strong feeling you have hit the nail squarely. A bug (or rude behavior if you prefer :smileyhappy: by the Support Center is what I suspected but hadn't found as yet. I still need to apply all updates on his machine. I just got SP3 applied, and I thought I had let Dell support do its thing, but apparently not.  So this may point me at multiple fixes.

He's two revs back on his BIOS, so that'll be next.

Thanks again; I should've found this in the forums but I guess I never hit on the right search words.