Jase's Place: VMware ESXi - Optiplex 620

 

 

 


VMware ESXi - Optiplex 620

I took an Optiplex 620 (P4 3.4, 2GB Ram, and an 80GB Sata drive), and attempted to install ESXi (3.5u2).

Well, initially, I got a Limit CPU Id error, with a nice "please disable this in the bios" message.

The box was fairly old, and had the A03 bios loaded. A03 wouldn't let me turn this off, so I went to Dell, grabbed the latest bios update, and updated the Bios to A11. After A11 was loaded, and I disabled this setting I was off and running.

As a result, ESXi installed fine, with no other tweaks.

The drive, and nic installed without any issues.

I haven't put any VM's on it yet, but will report back.

Updated: I've put several VM's on the box, and haven't seen any issues other than the Licensing Bug.

Also, I figured I'd whack the box when the new builds came out. I decided to install ESX 3.5.0 Update 2 Refresh, and what do you know, it installed fine too!








Dave, here's another one for your list.

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14 Comments:

At 12:16 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'm working with one of these... Watch out for U3 - it doesn't seem to like the SATA controller. My datastore is no longer found, and it won't instlal from the U3 disk.

 
At 12:31 PM, Blogger Jase McCarty said...

Look at this post for changes to /etc/vmware/simple.map
http://communities.vmware.com/message/1094059#1094059

And look at this one for my fix.
http://communities.vmware.com/message/1096772#1096772

 
At 10:53 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Can you further explain how you fixed ESX 3.5 update 3 issue with ICH7 controller not being able to see or create VMFS partition.

Installing a fresh or upgrade to ESX update 3 on Dell GX620 disables use of SATA controler for VMFS. After install I vi /etc/vmware/simple.map with entries for 8086:27c0 and 8086:27c4to ata_piix.o(both entries (27c0, 27c4) do not exist, have to add manually), save file, reboot host but still no access for VMFS.

Strangely the entries I added disappear in simple.map after reboot.

Also tried modifying /usr/share/hwdata/pci.idsto include entry for this controller as it is not listed there, same result.

I assume I can modify ESX after install instead of having to modify cd before install?

Thanks

Dave

 
At 3:42 PM, Blogger Jase McCarty said...

My modifications were after the update.

I will say, I started off with ESXi 3.5 Update 2, upgraded to Update 3, then made the fix.

I didn't start off with ESXi 3.5 Update 3.

Not sure if that is the difference or not.

 
At 12:33 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi,

I'have the same machine (optiplex gx620) but I have a bad error : unable to find a supported device to write.

I have the same disk (80 GB sata)

How can I fix it ?

Thanks

 
At 8:41 AM, Blogger Jase McCarty said...

I'll have to wipe my box out, and detail the steps I took to make this work.

I may have some time next week.

I'll see what I can do.

Jase

 
At 12:55 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

thanks, but now i'ts ok :-) my cd-rom usb drive is not good for install :-)

but it's possible to use the local disk or partition for the datastore ?

 
At 11:12 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

What formfactor GX620 is this? Or does it matter? I wasn't sure if the motherboard (and this sata controller etc) would be different in the different form factor cases and thus would want to grab a specific kind.

 
At 7:07 PM, Blogger Chris said...

Just purchased one of these here for $250 shipped.

RAM to 4gb at newegg is under $50 more.

http://www.pacificgeek.com/product.asp?id=104457

Chris

 
At 9:33 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi Jase, I have GX620 and training to install the latest verson of ESXi and I still recieving error message unable to find a supported device to write.
Do u have any idea what I am doing wrong

 
At 4:53 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'm a newbye.
I'm trying to install ESXi U 3 on my Optiplex GX630 but I've this error:
'unable to find a supported device to write'
I tryed to install from CD rom and usb stick: there is the same error

These my step:
- On the screen error ALT-F1 to access the console.
- login as 'root'
- run fdisk -l

I can see my disk!!

Any suggestion?

ciao Roberto

 
At 2:11 PM, Blogger Fred said...

Be sure to use Update 2 since Update 4 fails to support the SATA controller. I hate it when support is removed from newer versions.

 
At 2:44 PM, Blogger Paul Schwartz said...

I couldn't get this to work with U4, U3 or U2. Updated BIOS to A11, set SATA to mode to COMBINATION with no change. Beats me, I guess I'll just use XP with VMWare server for this.

 
At 2:52 PM, Blogger Paul said...

I take back the earlier post.

I tried U2 again with SATA in NORMAL mode and it worked.

I tried U3 and U4 again just to make sure, and no dice.

 

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