Hiya,
I wrote the whitepaper that is hosted on Xtravirt last year.
A scripted solution is definitely the way to go.
It was something I vaguely thought of doing at the time - but I ran out of time and motivation
Scripts run in a few mins as opposed to 2 or 3 hours to do it manually.
Bouke wrote a similar script to do the same thing a while ago.
http://www.jume.nl/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=34&Itemid=5
I do intend to republish the whitepaper doc - with a link to the script - but been too busy with the day job - will hopefully get round to it soon.....
Dinny
I wrote the whitepaper that is hosted on Xtravirt last year.
A scripted solution is definitely the way to go.
It was something I vaguely thought of doing at the time - but I ran out of time and motivation
Scripts run in a few mins as opposed to 2 or 3 hours to do it manually.
Bouke wrote a similar script to do the same thing a while ago.
http://www.jume.nl/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=34&Itemid=5
I do intend to republish the whitepaper doc - with a link to the script - but been too busy with the day job - will hopefully get round to it soon.....
Dinny
Update the script still exists and also works with ESX 3.5 Update 1 and Update 2 CDs.
Good points RPaker, but when doing kickstart installs with PXE, there aren't any prompt screens.
In the ks.cfg file, you have to explicitly specify a specific disk (ie sda, sdb, sdc, etc). Depending on how your hardware enumerates the PCI bus it may scan the HBAs first before the local storage. So, your SAN LUNs may be sda, sdb, sdc, sdd, etc....and your local storage something down the line like sde or sdf. In vSphere (ie ESX4) this is a bit different but still can be tricky at the same time.
When using HP hardware, their RAID is specified as cciss, so this problem is not as big of a deal on HP. (Dell and IBM RAID drivers enumerate their local storage and SAN as "sdX")
When doing a manual install by spinning up a CD, I always recommend pulling the cables, un-zoning the server, or using the above CD when installing and/or re-installing on a server attached to a live SAN with live LUNs. In my opinion, ts not worth the risk of human error.
Just my $0.02....
Dave O.