Hi folks,
This is kinda stupid, but here is my problem, in simple words : I need network to install network drivers, but, wait... the network needs network drivers !!
Basically, I'm stuck, and here is the platform :
HS22 Blade server with BNT 10GB Virtual Fabric switch, connected to Emulex 10G Virtual Fabric NICs (ServerEngines "brand" or whatever this is called).
That's all I have, so I'm looking for a way to install those drivers (basically, the vmware-esx-drivers-net-be2net_400.2.101.386.0-1.0.4.164009.222638.iso archive download on VMware site) without actually having the network.
I'm sure VMware could not expect people to install the network drivers only using... the network
The driver are on a ISO because you can put on CD and add it during the install process.
Andre
I'm using ESXi on a flash drive, there is no install process (well, there is dd on my computer, but that doesn't count I think)
You can reinstall your ESXi and specify the ISO with the drivers.
Otherwise without at least a network connection is quite difficult to add the drivers to a ESXi.
Andre
Reinstall ?
Again, this is a dump of the dd file provided in the ESXi ISO CD, there is no installation. Even the flash drive was provided pre-installed by IBM in the blade
Ok, problem solved, this is for the records.
This is something VMware must do something about : supporting only network driver installation, even for network drivers is a non sense and an alternative must be supported and provided.
Here is what I did :
- Mount the USB key on your machine (mounted on my Mac)
- Copy the driver to Hypervisor 1 partition, like in the root, whatever
- Re-plug the USB key and boot the server
- Switch to console using Alt-F1, and enter unsupported mode (blindly type "unsupported" then Enter and root password)
- put the host in maintenance mode (with "vim-cmd /hostsvc/maintenace_mode_enter")
- go in /bootbank (cd /bootbank)
- install the driver manually using esxupdate command (like "esxupdate --bundle sve-be2net-2.101.386.0-offline_bundle-222638.zip update")
- reboot
Guys, it is 2011, and the same issue persists :
- VMware does not provide out of the box the drivers for Emulex VFA
- Not does IBM is their OEM delivery the the USB key
So the technic remains the same, but for non US keyboard, my advice is to also put a script in the Hypervisor1 partition, that runs the maintenance mode and the driver installation without having to find special characters (_ ") on the keyboard :
#!/bin/sh
vim-cmd /hostsvc/maintenance_mode_enter
esxupdate --bundle SVE-be2net-2.102.518.0-offline_bundle-329992.zip update
Copy that (named sveinstall.sh for example), with SVE-be2net-2.102.518.0-offline_bundle-329992.zip in Hypervisor 1 partition.
Then you boot ESXi 4.1 USB key, and go into Technical Support Mode (after enabling it - LOCAL, obviously...)
then
# cd /bootbank
# sh sveinstall
That's it, reboot, reconfigure management network and connect using vSphere Client.