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Reply Re: ICH9R settings. Aug 20, 2008 1:59 PM
in response to: libove
Click to view Draco Dragonsfire's profile Novice Draco Dragonsfire 9 posts since
Jul 29, 2008
If i'm not mistaken, VT support is not needed to run ESXi and definitely isn't needed on ESX - which if I may add, ran fine on this CPU/machine model.
Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Aug 28, 2008 2:43 PM
Click to view Draco Dragonsfire's profile Novice Draco Dragonsfire 9 posts since
Jul 29, 2008
Success so far!

Booting off the CD is impossible, since it freezes but don't ask me why THIS works:

PXE booting works just fine!

So how come this doesn't work? Who the hell knows. So I have tftp-hpa running on a Gentoo machine here on our network to provide the cd's contents to the boot menu. Adding this to my pxelinux.cfg/default:

LABEL ESX 3i Install
kernel esxi/mboot.c32
append esxi/vmkernel.gz --- esxi/binmod.tgz --- esxi/ienviron.tgz --- esxi/cim.tgz --- esxi/oem.tgz --- esxi/license.tgz --- esxi/install.tgz

I copied the root of the cd off into the esxi folder under the tftp root directory. There's plenty of instructions on how to set this up as well out there, but I can help with some questions if you have them. Let me know how this works for ya'll. :)
Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Aug 29, 2008 8:36 AM
Click to view malaysiavm's profile Expert malaysiavm 488 posts since
Aug 24, 2008

I am currently running with the precision 490 on esx 3.5i as well as 3.5 for testing purpose. I will say the config different I had with you is, I am using the Xeon processor which is same with the server processor on PE 2950. For memory I am using 16GB ECC servers memory. I am running my environment without raid and only SATA DISK. Everything is working accordingly.

Malaysia VMware Communities - http://www.malaysiavm.com

Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Sep 11, 2008 5:01 PM
in response to: malaysiavm
Click to view The Other Jeff Eiben's profile Novice The Other Jeff Eiben 2 posts since
Sep 11, 2008

I'll admit I haven't read all of the posts on this thread, so if I'm revisiting old topics, I apologize.

I'm assuming changing the SATA options in the BIOS of the T3400 to RAID Autodetect/ATA is somehow adversely affecting the operation of the SATA optical drive. Hence the lockups when using that mode.

I have come up with a different answer that is easier than setting up a PXE environment. All you need is a blank USB Key (Thumb, Pen, Jump, etc.) Drive and about 10 minutes. Here goes:

  1. Download UNetbootin. I used the Windows version available here: http://sourceforge.net/project/downloading.php?groupname=unetbootin&filename=unetbootin-windows-281.exe&use_mirror=internap
  2. Run UNetbootin, select Distribution, FreeBSD, Version 7.0. At the bottom select USB Drive as the Type and the appropriate drive letter for your blank drive as the Drive. Click OK.
  3. Once UNetbootin completes, copy the contents of the ESXi CD to the USB Drive.
  4. On the USB drive, rename syslinux.cfg to syslinux.cfg.OLD.
  5. Make a copy of the ISOLINUX.CFG file and rename it to syslinux.cfg.
  6. Make sure the T3400 SATA Operation is set to RAID Autodetect/ATA in the BIOS.
  7. Plug the USB drive in to the T3400 and boot to it.

Using this method I had two T3400s installed and configured in less than 15 minutes.

I hope this helps everyone out. Enjoy.


Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Sep 11, 2008 11:29 PM
in response to: The Other Jeff Eiben
Click to view andy1121's profile Novice andy1121 2 posts since
May 21, 2006

I am using the usb key to install.

Always response "Unable to find a supported device to write the vmware esx server 3i 3.5.0 image to."

My T3400 BIOS Version is A07

And you?

And everyone error log with me the same?

Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Sep 12, 2008 5:26 AM
in response to: andy1121
Click to view The Other Jeff Eiben's profile Novice The Other Jeff Eiben 2 posts since
Sep 11, 2008
A05
Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Sep 12, 2008 7:40 AM
in response to: andy1121
Click to view Draco Dragonsfire's profile Novice Draco Dragonsfire 9 posts since
Jul 29, 2008
andy1121:
Remember to NOT use RAID or AHCI for your drives, only ATA mode will work.


Jeff Elben: Thanks for that USB boot method. That should help out a bunch of people, since technically that method should work the same as PXE, since it's not using anything on that ATA/SATA bus. Rather an odd problem to say the least. Maybe some sort of IRQ conflict or somesuch between the CD drive and HDD. shrug

And yes, USB would be faster and much easier to set up! :)

Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Sep 16, 2008 10:50 PM
in response to: Draco Dragonsfire
Click to view andy1121's profile Novice andy1121 2 posts since
May 21, 2006

Oh My GOD~~~~

Thank you response.


Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Mar 6, 2009 6:17 PM
in response to: andy1121
Click to view iben's profile Novice iben 5 posts since
Oct 6, 2005

FWIW -

I've recently setup VMware ESX Server 3i build-123629 (Update 3) on both a Dell Precision T3400 and a Precision 390 BIOS version 2.6.0 (05/19/08)

Seagate ST3160815AS Sata 160GB HD

In the BIOS I set SATA Operation to "RAID Autodetect / AHCI".

It was set to "RAID Autodetect / ATA" and there is also the option for "RAID". I tried the ATA and got the no disk found message during installation.

The CD did work fine in both cases and was able to run the installer all the way up to the disk detection point.

It is working fine on the Net with the on board Broadcom GigE NIC too BTW.

This is the ISO file I downloaded to run install these servers.

VMware ESX Server 3i U3 Installable Refresh
Version 3.5 Update 3 | 123629
- 11/06/08
241 MB
Binary (.iso)
md5sum: 444e1f57d1bc2296391b74e9ee406acb(¹)

https://www.vmware.com/tryvmware/p/download.php?p=esxi&a=DOWNLOAD_FILE&baseurl=http://download2.vmware.com/software/vi/&filename=VMware-VMvisor-InstallerCD-3.5.0_Update_3-123629.i386.iso

Hope that helps some of you out there...

Reply Re: Dell Precision T3400, ESXi, something else, or forget virtualization? Apr 27, 2009 2:21 PM
in response to: iben
Click to view lxupls1's profile Lurker lxupls1 1 posts since
Jun 17, 2008

I was able to setup esxi 3.5 update 4 on a T3400 by setting SATA Operation to "RAID Autodetect / AHCI".

Works great.

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