How To Troubleshoot The iDRAC Virtual Console

iDRAC Virtual Console Troubleshooting Follow these steps if you're unable to connect to the Virtual Console using HTML5, Java or ActiveX, or if you can connect but your keyboard doesn't work.

Hello. Thanks for taking the time to review the sysman training. In this video we'll be covering how to troubleshoot the iDRAC virtual console. The first problem we'll look at is what to do when you cannot open the virtual console. First let's check and see if we can connect over port 5900.

Go to the iDRAC URL and add colon 5900. We should see a white page stating that we have an SSL certificate. If we do not see this page then the port is probably blocked. You can try testing from another device to see if the issue is isolated to that first system. Another thing to try would be a RACADM rackreset. Okay, now let's look at some plug-in issues. We'll start with HTML5. This next issue is when the pop-up blocker stops us from starting the virtual console.

This one is an easy fix. Simply click on the banner at the bottom of the screen and choose the option to always allow. You may see this pop-up with Internet Explorer, click cancel to be brought to the correct login page. Let's take a look at this next example. We attempt to launch the virtual console and we do see the certificate but the console is still unable to finish launching. Since we are using Internet Explorer let's take a look at the compatibility settings. Click on the cog at the top right of the browser, then click on compatibility view settings, remove the iDRAC IP and uncheck the box for display intranet sites in compatibility view. For this scenario once we log back in and try to launch the console again we are now able to use the console. Now we'll look at the Java plugin.

We attempt to launch the console then download the JNLP file that is provided by the iDRAC. Since this is dependent on having Java installed, by default you will be unable to launch this file. Okay, now that we've installed Java we will download the JNLP file once more and attempt to connect. You will need to agree and continue past multiple pop-ups to get to the console. If you get an error indicating a security issue or otherwise still cannot connect using the Java plugin we can go to the Java configuration panel and verify the security settings. Click the 'Security' tab. Sometimes we need to add an IP to the exception list. Click 'Edit site list', now click 'Add', then type in the URL for the iDRAC IP. Once complete press 'OK' to exit the menus. This should resolve Java security issues. ActiveX is the last plugin. Upon launching we see we need to install the plugin. Similar to the Java plugin you will need to wait for the pop-ups to appear.

Once they appear you need to agree to them to be allowed access to the console. If you have installed the plugin in the past but it is not working be sure that the plugin is enabled. Go to the cog in the top right then click on 'Manage add-ons'. You may need to reinstall the plug-in, or unblock the pop-ups to allow you to install if it is not listed here. One of the issues we see is that the console is enabled and it connects but the keyboard and mouse is not working properly. The first thing to check is to make sure the 'Attach state' is set to 'Auto attach'.

If we find it is already set to this you may need to toggle back and forth between 'Detached' and 'Attached'. We'll wrap this video by going over some final thoughts. Let's see how we might be able to quickly decide if an issue is most likely the server hardware or with the operating system. The first thing we can ask is does the keyboard or mouse redirection work during POST? Remember POST is pre-operating system. If you are able to get into the BIOS or select a different POST menu item while using the virtual console then the console is working correctly and the issue would most likely be with the operating system.

This next question, does a physical keyboard and mouse work? If their answer is no, then the system may be having some sort of hardware issue. If a physical keyboard works but the console redirection does not even in the POST then we may have something corrupted in the iDRAC config. As a last resort after completing all other troubleshooting attempts you can reset the iDRAC config and test with a default config. After that the config can either be rebuilt from scratch or you can try and restore a backup of the config.

Thank you for watching this video from our iDRAC training series.