Dell Client Manager, Part 3: Dell BIOS Upgrade

Filed under: Dell Client Manager Configuration, Best Practices, Configuration Management

Submitted by trb48 on 8 July, 2008 - 15:55.

Just like everything else in the computer world, a computer BIOS needs to be updated and maintained. It can be a difficult task that in the past required the system admin to go to every computer and manually update the BIOS. In the not to distant past it even required a floppy disk to get the job done. Those days are over (thankfully). One of the great features of the Dell Client Manager is BIOS update tasks.

Resources:

There are some great resources on how to setup, configure, and use the Dell Client Manager. Here are some useful links:

BIOS Upgrade Policy

Here is how you can create a task to update the BIOS on your computers:

Open the Altiris 6.5 Console
Then, go to View >> Solutions >> Dell Client Manager
Now, go to Dell Client Manager >> Tasks >> Dell BIOS Policies >> BIOS Update Policy

I suggest that before we do anything that we clone the policy. Here is how you do that:

Right click on "BIOS Upgrade Policy"

Click to view.
Select "Clone"

Click to view.
A new window will appear where you can name the policy. I would like to update the BIOS on my Dell Optiplex GX280s, so I will name it "Dell Optiplex GX280 BIOS Update"

Click to view.
Once you click the "OK" button, the policy will be created

Let's go through the options:

Enabled: click the checkbox and then the "Apply" button to enable this policy. You should enable the policy when you are all done with setting all of the options
Name: We already named the policy when we created it
Description: Write something simple so you can instantly know what this policy does
Upgrade: In this section you will need to get the BIOS installed from Dell, here is how:
- Go to www.dell.com/support
- Click on the button titled: "I'm looking for drivers and downloads"
- You can now "Choose a Model", "Choose by Service Tag" or "Choose from Your List". I usually select "Choose a Model" by pressing the "Select Model" button
- Under "Select Product Family" choose: Desktops >> Optiplex >> GX280
- It will show you the model number and a picture of the computer you choose. If everything matches up click the "Confirm" button
- Make sure that the Operating System drop down reflects the OS you will install the BIOS on
- You will see a category titled "BIOS", click the plus sign
- Now you can click the "Download Now"
- Save the BIOS file to your desktop
- Now that you have downloaded the BIOS, you can click on the "Browse" button
- A "Choose file" window will appear. Navigate to your desktop and choose the BIOS file you just downloaded. Then click the "Open" button
  - Notification Server will unpackage the BIOS installer and pull out the files that it needs to update the BIOS
- If you are downgrading the BIOS, you can click the box next to "Allow version downgrades"
Collection: This lets you choose what computers get the BIOS update. I suggest that you apply the update to a test group of computers, then you can push it out to a live group of computers
Use multicast when the Altiris Agent's multicast option is enabled: this settings isn't a huge deal. The BIOS update is really small
Refresh inventory after the BIOS update: This is checked by default. It is nice to have this set because you can run a report and see if the policy actually worked.
BIOS Setup Password: If you have set a BIOS password enter it here. Without a password the BIOS will not update
Scheduling Options: The default setting is "Run once ASAP". This is great for a normal environment. If you use a piece of software like Deep Freeze that won't work. The computer has to be frozen in order for the update to actually work. Here is how to set the job to work with some security software:
- Uncheck "Run once..." and checked "Schedule"
- Now, I click on the link titled "No schedule has been defined". A new window will open titled "Schedule Editor"
- Make sure that you click the "Once" radio button
- Then you can select a time and date that works with how you run with your security software
- Note: If you are not running a Deep Freeze or similar software just work around your user's schedule
- If you want the user to run, want the user to be notified of the task, or you want to warn them before running you can select the appropriate check boxes.
- Here is the end result:
  
  Click to view.
Power Management: I want to make sure that the job runs, so I checked the "Power up the computer...". It is a best practice to restart the computer after a BIOS update, so I left the "Restart the computer..." setting checked. I left the "User can defer for:" option the default of 60 minutes

Once you have all of those settings just right, you can click the check box next to "Enable" at the top of the screen. Then you can check the "Apply" button. Here is my final product:

Click to view.

Notes: Here are a few things to keep in mind

You will need to create a task per computer model that you want to update. Also, now that you have the Dell Client Manager Agent installed on the computers you can tell what version of the BIOS that each computer is running. This can help you target the machines that need the update.
Be careful when you create the schedule. When I first tested this out I made a few mistakes. In the Schedule Editor instead of setting it to "Once" I had it set to "At System Startup". That means that every time the system started it would update the BIOS. That is a huge problem, especially since I could not change that setting because as soon as the system started it would detect it had to run the job. I had to reimage the computers to get rid of that setting.

Execution Status: Under the "Power Management" section there is a button titled "View Report". This is where you can see of the task ran or not. The default report is for 30 days. I have found that the report will run faster if you run it for the past day.

Reports:

There are a few reports that you can run that will help you determine what computers needs to be updated and what computers have been updated. Here is what you need to do:

Go to: Dell Client Manager >> Reports >> Hardware Inventory >> Systems with Specified Hardware Value
Select the product line from the drop down
Select the Model from the drop down
Next to "Hardware Value:" select the "Select inventory data" link
A new window titled "Settings Picker" will appear. In the first drop down change it to "BIOS Element" and click the "Refresh" button
We want to see the "[BIOS Element] Build Number", so check that box
Click the "OK" button. When you hit "OK" the "Settings Picker" window disappears
Now, you can click the "Refresh" button to see the report
Under the report, you can click the "Computer Name" field to sort the report

You can also do the following:

Go to Dell Client Manager >> Reports >> Systems Reporting BIOS Settings Data
Click on the "Run this report" link in the right pane
Select the appropriate product line
Select the appropriate model
Now you will see a graph showing you what computers in that product line and model type are reporting data

Click to view.
Now double click on the "Reported BIOS Settings Data" bar
Now, you can see a list of computers that are reporting data. This list includes the BIOS version of each computer

Finally, you can do this (this is probably the easiest method):

Go to Dell Client Manager >> Reports >> BIOS >> Systems with Specified BIOS Version
In the Right pane make sure to select the product line, the model, and the BIOS Version
In the BIOS Version text box enter the version number (it is part of the EXE name that we downloaded earlier or you can find it on the BIOS screen on your computer)

Conclusion:

As you have read above, this is a pretty easy process. The best part is that you can do it all from the Altiris Console. You only have to visit every computer in your environment if you want to. You can also see if the task worked or not. It is time savers like these that make choosing Altiris and the Dell Client Manager a no brainer.

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