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January 19th, 2026 21:55
Poweredge R740 no video, keyboard, idrac not reset
I recently purchased a poweredge R740 off the used market. After putting some memory into it, it doesn’t POST: no video, no keyboard.
i can access the idrac via the idrac direct usb connection from the front, but the idrac hasn’t been reset as i can see the hostname in the title of the idrac login page.
Its service tag said it was deployed with the legacy password, but “root / calvin” doesn’t work. So I’m pretty sure the idrac is still configured.
The status light remains blue when I have the case cover on and both PS plugged into power. Video and keyboard remain off.
my hunch is that the idrac is configured to disallow local video and keyboard, however, I can’t confirm.
I’ve reset the clear nvram and password jumpers several times. No change in server behavior.
Ive removed all risers and cards, and NDC, brought it down to a single CPU and single RDIMM, and same behavior.
idrac web ui answers and requests login, but I can’t reset it without going into the bios, and I can’t access the bios without video and keyboard.
it doesn’t PXE boot, so I can’t load an os on it either.
is there a way to reset the idrac configuration using jumpers, or a direct connection to the racadm command line via serial?
DELL-Joey C
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January 22nd, 2026 01:40
Hi,
Usually the video disablement is in BIOS, I tried to look around in iDRAC, there isn't any option to disable video. Since you have tried clearing NVRAM, have you tried removing CMOS battery and wait for awhile before installing it back to check that helped to restore BIOS to defaults.
Just to check, when turning on the server, does it have any drive indicator blinking as if it's running checks? Fan are spinning? You have tried both front and back VGA port connect to monitor, right?
Next is, there are a set of LEDs on the mainboard, refer to no. 32: https://www.dell.com/support/manuals/en-ca/poweredge-r740/per740_ism_pub/system-board-jumpers-and-connectors?guid=guid-7233c18e-b255-4620-be3d-c1a348083558&lang=en-us. If those LEDs are all lit, it means that the server is ready to boot hence you do not have video output only. If not all lit, let us know. It might be having issues. If none lit, mainboard is faulty.
RACADM needs the iDRAC password if you're using remote RACADM. You might not be able to launch localhost RACADM as you do not have video output.