The Dell iDRAC (Integrated Dell Remote Access Controller) is a proprietary out-of-band management solution embedded in Dell PowerEdge servers. It enables administrators to remotely monitor, manage, update, and troubleshoot servers regardless of the operating system state or power status. On premise servers are commonly 'set and forget' by a business, despite how often they are critical to operation. If maintenance schedules are easy to do, they will be done. If they are difficult to do, they will only be done through necessity, or adversity. Out of Band management systems, such as the Dell iDRAC, lower the effort required to perform the maintenance required and so I feel they are a mandatory requirement on any on premise piece of 'server' infrastructure. ## Key Features - Full server control independent of OS or power state. - Remote KVM and ISO mounting for OS installation or recovery. - Embedded management for firmware updates, diagnostics, and provisioning. - Real-time metrics and alerting - eg, power, thermal, and storage drive health. While it is possible to configure these systems to send an email when there is an issue, or work to do, it is much more reliable to use SNMP monitoring tools such as Logicmonitor or PRTG to monitor and provide actions items. If the server is configured to send an email, and the email doesn't work or is misconfigured, it is not obvious. If you have another application constantly checking in on the device in a visible and reliable way, you have a much higher chance of catching something when it goes wrong. ## Experience - Managed user roles and access policies to ensure secure remote administration. - Remotely accessed, deployed and recovered operating systems and states. - Integrated iDRAC with SNMP-based monitoring systems - Performed firmware updates and diagnostics using Lifecycle Controller