I picked up a Dell (Avocent) 2161DS-2 (same as 4161DS?) KVM recently, and needed to use the serial port to upgrade the software.
Naturally, the serial port pinout is non-standard and requires a proprietary cable which comes with the KVM. Dell part numbers 80DH7 and 3JY78 might be involved. I don't have, and have never seen these cables.
I was able to to find the RX, TX and Ground pins and interact with the system using 9600, 8, N, 1.
Pinout in red text |
Is the color coding inside these adaptors standardized? If so this may help. |
The system prints some unsolicited messages ("welcome" or somesuch) a little while after power-up.
Notes from upgrading the firmware from MacOS 12:
# Grab the firmware
URL="https://dl.dell.com/RACK SOLUTIONS/DELL_MULTI-DEVICE_A04_R301142.exe"
wget -P /tmp "$URL"
# Start MacOS tftp service
sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/tftp.plist
# Extract the firmware (it's a self-extracting exe, but we can open it with unzip)
sudo unzip -d /private/tftpboot "/tmp/$(basename "$URL")" Omega_DELL_1.3.51.0.fl
# Now, using the menu on the KVM serial port, point it toward the MacOS TFTP service
# to retrieve the Omega_DELL_1.3.51.0.fl file
This worked for me. I bought the adapter needed from CablesAndKits. Thank you!!! (Now I just have to figure out how to get past the TLS issue)
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