ESXi & boot from san

[dingding]

can i install a ESXi standalone edition in a SAN disk?

[weinstein5]

I do not see why not as long as your HBA is able to be identified as a boot controller by your server's bios and the HBA supports it

[dingding]

i also think so, but in http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi35_san_guide.pdf, it seems most storage do not support ESXi installatable edtion boot from san, e.g. EMC CX3. so maybe we are technically correct.

[lamw]

States that boot from SAN is supported, hopefully there is a few major SAN vendor that supports this feature.

[Dave_Mishchenko]

It may be the case that the install document is out of date, but it states that this would not be supported. Or perhaps someone did a copy of the ESX features as it displays the same info for the storage section (http://www.vmware.com/products/vi/esx/esx_features.html).

http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_35/esx_3i_i/r35/vi3_35_25_3i_i_setup.pdf - from page 19

>You use the ESX Server 3i CD‐ROM to install the ESX Server 3i software onto a SATA,

>SAS, or SCSI hard drive. Installing on a USB drive, an IDE/ATA drive, or a SAN‐based

>drive, such as FC SAN or iSCSI SAN, is currently not supported.

[dingding]

there exists contradiction in VMware's document. anyway, i believe this is technically support.

[svenben]

It doesnt work with Qlogic qla2342. The same server works with qla3242 when booting from local harddisk.

Has anyone got SAN b oot working? If so, which HBA?

[dingding]

i think ESXi can't be installed on a SAN lun, because:

1) i tested it, and failed.

2) from http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_35/esx_3i_i/r35u2/vi3_35_25_u2_3i_i_setup.pdf, p21,

NOTE You cannot install ESX Server 3i on a LUN, but you can create your virtual

machines on one.

[svenben]

I agree. I dont know why VMWare dont allow ESXi to be install on the Qlogic card.

And on http://www.vmware.com/products/esxi/features.html I can read:

Boot from SAN. Run VMware ESXi installations on

diskless configurations of blade and rack mount servers by booting from

SAN. Simplify backups and disaster recovery by eliminating the need to

separately backup local attached server disks.

Why do they write tis in their feature list?

[Wittbert]

Hi!

very interesting! I thought boot from SAN is working...

Can I attach FibreChannel storage as a datastore for my virtual machines with the free ESX3i ?

Thanks in advance

Benjamin

[Jona5]

Not on ESXi. You can with Infrastructure 3.

[weinstein5]

Yes you can use FC storage with ESXi - just make sure you are using a supported FC HBA - and yes your hsould be able to boot from SAN with ESXi -

[Jona5]

Have you tested this yourself?

I have tested Qlogic qle2462 and qla2342 without any luck. They both work fine with ESXi, but fail to install ESXi in a boot LUN.

[weinstein5]

stand corrected - checked documentation - Boot from SAN works only with ESX -

[Wittbert]

Hello Guys!

thanks for the replies!

Ok boot from san is not really necessary with esx3i , I think..

the main thing is, that I can attach FC-Storage!

Thanks!

Kind regards Benjamin

[Lofrano]

Hi everyone,

Is there any update about this thread ?

I would like to install ESXi on a IBM Blade HS21XM connected to a DS3400 via Qlogic FC card.

I've already configured the SAN and the FC Zoning so I can see the correct LUN at bootup, but ESXi says that it can't find an available disk to use for installation.

Did everyone solved this issue ? HaveI to use ESX version to manage this configuration ?

Thanks in advance.

[Dave_Mishchenko]

I don't beleive it is supported for ESXi 3.5 and for 4.0 it only would have experimental support. The below is from the 4.0 install guide for ESXi.

>> Installing on a Fibre Channel SAN is supported experimentally. Do not attempt to install ESXi with a SAN attached, unless you want to try this experimental feature.

[Lofrano]

Hi Dave,

Thank a lot for your quick reply.

Ill try the experimental feature While waiting for internal disks.

Have a good day.

Max.

[Dave_Mishchenko]

You should also be able to boot from a USB flash drive with the HS21XM.

[Lofrano]

Yes, I've a 2 Gb Usb key with a bootable ESXi, but there are 2 blades deisgned for virtualization and customer don't want to manage usb key switching while (re)booting blades.

Max.