I got the sata controller on Asus P5N32-E SLI working after changing the following:

Edited the file /etc/vmware/pciid/sata_nv.xml
Changed the last id to: 037f
And the name changed to MCP55 SATA Controller.

Then i did run the esxcfg-pciid

Rebooted, and it started like a dream

The 2 onboard network cards did work out of the box
(Some Nvidia network card)

doh. Maybe I was too quick to post.

It didn't come up with the error but no VMFS no more.

Trying patch now

again seems like I was premature with my conclusions.

It allows me to create VMFS. However I keep getting errors like the picture below

If you're getting mounting root problems with ESX 3.5 on the host, then it's a bit harder to fix with ESXi as the installer in running the ESXi vmkernel and not Linux as with the ESX regular install. You would either have to modify oem.tgz on the CD before the install or install ESXi onto a USB flash drive and run it from there (and then modify oem.tgz). Take a look at this thread - http://communities.vmware.com/click.jspa?searchID=-1&objectType=2&objectID=1006219 at what you could do.

Hi all,

I've managed to install ESXi 3.5 onto a whitebox PC. It's an ASRock AM2nF3-VSTA motherboard, which uses an nVidia nForce 3 controller. There's two disks in there - a 160GB Seagate, and an 80GB seagate. I've found copying files onto this box to be horrendously slow though. I've got an Intel Gig-e card in there, and I copied the ftp binary from one of our other ESX 3.5 boxen onto it. I'm pulling files from my own desk PC (also on Gig-e) which is hosting them with Filezilla.

When copying to the 160GB drive (which also contains the boot partition) it goes about 9Mbs. Not amazingly fast, but quick enough. When copying to the 80GB drive, however, I'm lucky to get 2Mbs! Copying 8GB files at this speed is NOT fun!!! The drives are set up with busmaster enabled in BIOS (made no difference either way), so I'm not really sure what it is.

I've had a look around here, and not found much about the issue. It's probably pretty unique to be honest. Just wondering if anybody has any pointers or other ideas?

Previously, the same box was running SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 10, and VMWare Server 2 beta, and worked OK, so it looks like a software issue, but I could be wrong.

Hi,

here is v0.62 but had no time to try it with 3.5u2.

.. so now i´m off to Italy .... espresso, aperol spritz, pesce, grappa

kind regards,
reinhard

Downloaded ESX3i and did the USB boot thing, and am happy to say that ESX3i detects both the onboard NIC and the SATA controller (ESX 3.5 didn't). Well pleased, considering these boxes are around £115 each (with £55 for a corsair 4gb mem kit). A proper install of ESX3i to disk will not work as it doesn't detect the onboard SATA during install. Using the USB boot, I have created a VMFS 3 datastore on the local SATA disk no problems.

Got myself 2 running ESX3i from Kingston DataTraveller 100 1gb USB keys (PC world do 2 for £9). 6GB RAM each ... works a dream. The ML even has internal USB port on the mobo

Now to buy a 3rd and run it as an iSCSI server

Edit: To avoid confusion, I'm referring to ML115 G5's - Opteron 1214 dual cores

Yes, I plan to run the 3rd as an iSCSI server. There are a few free Windows iSCSI targets, or I'll run openfiler.

I've been buying dual-port NICs from ebay like they are going out of fashion

Have a gig card in each ML dedicated to iSCSI, and enough cards to make 2 NICs in the iSCSI box dedicated to iSCSI. The plan is just to hook each ML to a port on the iSCSI box using crossover.

Will have a nice little setup then