I think the previous post put the hammer on the nail. TEST IT IN THE LAB/R&D!!!!! I have little sympathy for folks that take bleeding edge releases right into production with no testing. Everyone was quick to blame VMware for not finding a bug when almost none of them bothered to test anything themselves. I for one will test this in my test lab. We have a checklist of items to check when upgrading any OS whether it be Windows or ESX. I highly recommend everyone do the same before they rush to criticize VMware.

That's my 2 cents and beleive me, that's all it's worth.

ESX & ESXi 3.5 Update 3, rendered my Dell Optiplex GX620's local datastore useless.

The upgrade (and fresh install) will not support a VMFS file system on my ICH-7 based controller.

To be honest with you, it kind of preturbs me, given that it is a decent box to test on.

Now I've got to go get another controller, or setup another box with an NFS or ISCSI target? That's just silly, especially when 3.5.0, 3.5.0 U1 and 3.5.0 U2 worked fine.

Jase McCarty
http://www.jasemccarty.com
Co-Author of VMware ESX Essentials in the Virtual Data Center
(ISBN:1420070274) from Auerbach

I don't think that's a fair comment re the U2 bug, because it was accidental kill date code that had nothing to do with end-user testing. Plenty of people had it in test for a while, looked stable, rolled live, later the date kill went into effect. It was quite correct to blame VMW for that one.

That said, of course it is important to always put new released into test first. But unless you have a lot of money to truly replicate a prod environment in test, it's usually even better to wait for some serious prod feedback from others as well. Usually no reason to jump headfirst into anything new unless there's something critical.

BAH! We upgraded, Production. So what? I always stay ahead of the curve.

And you call yourself a TECH!??! Hahaha.. that's funny... You have little sympathy eh, or maybe you don't have what it takes to know your envirnoment and know how to solve issues, that's what it sounds like to me. What's the matter Col. Sanders, chicken?!?!?

Good! But don't criticize those that enjoy playing with the NEW stuff when it comes out. If it breaks I can fix it.. I support it, that's what we are here for to LEARN! Someone has to be first, so you over conservative people can know what to expect. I prefer to stay AHEAD of the game rather than hearing it second hand...

I have done some DL380 G5's and DL585 G2

They've made some changes in the PCI database that you should be able to work around with a custom simple.map file. The first list is from update 2 and the 2nd is update 3. You'll see that they've started using the IDE driver instead of ata_piix. This is likely to do with the fact that the ICH7 controller is now supported in IDE mode for use with SATA CD-ROMs.

8086 27c0 0000 0000 storage ata_piix 82801GB/GR/GH (ICH7 Family) Serial ATA Storage Controller IDE
8086 27c1 0000 0000 storage ahci 82801GR/GH (ICH7 Family) Serial ATA Storage Controller AHCI
8086 27c3 0000 0000 storage ahci 2801GR/GH (ICH7 Family) Serial ATA Storage Controller RAID
8086 27c4 0000 0000 storage ata_piix 82801GBM/GHM (ICH7 Family) Serial ATA Storage Controller IDE
8086 27c5 0000 0000 storage ahci 82801GBM/GHM (ICH7 Family) Serial ATA Storage Controller AHCI
8086 27c6 0000 0000 storage ahci 82801GHM (ICH7-M DH) Serial ATA Storage Controller RAID
8086 27df 0000 0000 storage ide 82801G (ICH7 Family) IDE Controller

8086:27c0 0000:0000 storage ide
8086:27c1 0000:0000 storage ahci
8086:27c3 0000:0000 storage ahci
8086:27c4 0000:0000 storage ide
8086:27c5 0000:0000 storage ahci
8086:27c6 0000:0000 storage ahci
8086:27df 0000:0000 storage ide

Would you be able to update both 27c0 and 27c4 and then post a copy of the file here? I'm sure you won't be the last one to have this problem.