I finally got this to work using the USB stick, I tried a variety of steps but I think the solution was this:Format the USB stick using a Windows 10 laptop and let it select the default filesystem and allocation Make sure boot from USB was enabled Make sure secure boot was off Once I was able to see the .exe file in the BIOS update screen, I was able to update the firmware.I'd still like to know how to use the remote update, that would be the easiest, but for whatever reason it never sees an updated image on the Dell servers to use.
I'm not having any luck applying the latest BIOS update to my Inspiron 5400 (ubuntu 20.04, not that it matters) with either the boot from USB mode or the remote update option in the F12 menu. I was successful in updating once before, using the usb method, but now I am unable to see the USB stick in the list of boot devices despite having turned secure boot off.No problem right, just use the remote process and do it over the network right?  When I try that, it says it cannot find an updated version on the dell servers, even though one exists and is marked urgent when I search for updated by my service tag.Any tips are appreciated, seems like most of the docs I ran across are quite old and haven't helped at all.
BIOS updates aren't working from USB or Remote