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MrJinx2008
Contributor
Contributor

Dell Optiplex 960 working on ESXi

You can get ESX 3.5i running on this great new machine from Dell with a few adjustments.

I've ordered it with the Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 3.33GHz + 8MB memory.

First you need to disable the onboard network and order a supported network card. I ordered a Intel Pro/1000 PT network card which fits in the PCIe slot.

Next you'll need ESX3.5i to recognize the onboard ICH10R (disk) controller. This may be a bit hard if you don't know linux, but there is a great tutorial on:

To help you with this, all you have to do is add the following PCI id's:

In simple.map

after 8086:3200 and before 8086:7010 add

8086:3a02 0000:0000 storage ahci

In pci.ids

after 3582 and before 5200 add

3a02 ICH10(R)

NOTE: Don't use the ICH10_oem.tgz file that is provided on that page, it won't work for your Dell.

In your bios don't forget to disable all things you don't need like onboard network/soundcard. And make sure you use AHCI for your harddisk.

Final tip: use the USB boot for ESX3.5i

The best part is that the Dell Optiplex 960 is very energy-friendly! Idle it runs at 36 Watt which makes this the ultimate whitebox for me.

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15 Replies
nick_couchman
Immortal
Immortal

I've run ESXi on the Dell Optiplex 755 machines - the onboard GigE network card even works! Not sure about the SATA controller - I was just booting off a USB thumb drive.

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keying
Contributor
Contributor

MrJinx, was your ICH10R recognized as 3a02 or 3a3e?

I'm trying to install ESXi onto a Dell Studio 540 that has the ICH10R, too, but lspci shows the controller being recognized as a 3a3e.

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MrJinx2008
Contributor
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Lspci recognized it as 3a02.

Did you enable AHCI in bios?

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keying
Contributor
Contributor

I'm starting to realize that AHCI is the key.

The Dell 540 only supports RAID and ATA as the SATA mode. No AHCI option.

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Dave_Mishchenko
Immortal
Immortal

You might try editing the files to load the ata_piix driver for the controller when you have it in ATA mode.

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keying
Contributor
Contributor

Yeah, I tried loading ata_piix along with the other alternatives listed in the file, none of them worked any better Smiley Wink

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nitehawke
Contributor
Contributor

keying,

Did you ever find a solution? I've got a Dell Studio 540 and am also trying to install ESXi without any success because it can't detect the ICH10 controller. Darn Dell for eliminating AHCI in the BIOS.

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keying
Contributor
Contributor

Nope, never did find a satisfactory solution. Even loading up these cheap PCI SiI3512 cards wasnt that great either... got random hangs and freezes.

Our next step is to try a 3Ware PCI card and see if a "real" SATA card delivers performance.

If that doesn't work, then we'll run Windows on these Smiley Sad

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nitehawke
Contributor
Contributor

Bummer... Smiley Sad

If you find out anything else, please post to this thread. I've got a few Studio 540's that have Q8200 proc's in them which means no Hyper-V either because these processors did not have Intel's Virtualization Technology (!!)

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dbenton
Contributor
Contributor

I've followed your instructions but ESX3.5i will not see the disk storage. My simple.map matched your description exactly. My pci.ids file does not have a 3582 or 5200.

Any suggestions?

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Dave_Mishchenko
Immortal
Immortal

Would you be able to post the PCI id for your controller - http://www.vm-help.com/esx/esx3i/find_PCI_ID.php?

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dbenton
Contributor
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Thanks for the link...

RESULTS. My guess is it's the one in BOLD.

~ # lspci -v

00:00.00 Host bridge Bridge: Intel Corporation

Class 0600: 8086:2e10

00:01.00 PCI bridge Bridge: Intel Corporation

Class 0604: 8086:2e11

00:02.00 VGA compatible controller Display controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0300: 8086:2e12

00:02.01 Display controller Display controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0380: 8086:2e13

00:03.00 Communication controller Communication controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0780: 8086:2e14

00:03.02 IDE interface Mass storage controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0101: 8086:2e16

00:03.03 Serial controller Communication controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0700: 8086:2e17

00:26.00 USB Controller Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c03: 8086:3a67

00:26.01 USB Controller Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c03: 8086:3a68

00:26.02 USB Controller Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c03: 8086:3a69

00:26.07 USB Controller Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c03: 8086:3a6c

00:28.00 PCI bridge Bridge: Intel Corporation

Class 0604: 8086:3a70

00:28.01 PCI bridge Bridge: Intel Corporation

Class 0604: 8086:3a72

00:29.00 USB Controller Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c03: 8086:3a64

00:29.01 USB Controller Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c03: 8086:3a65

00:29.02 USB Controller Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c03: 8086:3a66

00:29.07 USB Controller Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c03: 8086:3a6a

00:30.00 PCI bridge Bridge: Intel Corporation 82801BA/CA/DB/EB PCI Bridge

Class 0604: 8086:244e

00:31.00 ISA bridge Bridge: Intel Corporation

Class 0601: 8086:3a14

00:31.02 RAID bus controller Mass storage controller: Intel Corporation

  • Class 0104: 8086:2822*

00:31.03 SMBus Serial bus controller: Intel Corporation

Class 0c05: 8086:3a60

03:00.00 Ethernet controller Network controller: Intel Corporation 82572EI Gigabit Ethernet Controller

Class 0200: 8086:10b9

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Dave_Mishchenko
Immortal
Immortal

The ESXi ICH driver doesn't support RAID so you'll have to change that in the BIOS. You'll typically IDE or AHCI. If you pick IDE you may have to use the install on IDE instructions that you'll find on vm-help.com.

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MrJinx2008
Contributor
Contributor

You probably missed this step from the startpost:

In your bios don't forget to disable all things you don't need like onboard network/soundcard. And make sure you use AHCI for your harddisk.

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dbenton
Contributor
Contributor

Nope. I did that. The BIOS is set to RAID Autodetect / ACHI which states RAID is signed drives otherwise ACHI.

Each drive states btoh SATA drives are controlled by the ACHI BIOS.

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