[Installation] Unable to find supported device to write the vmware esxi 4.1.0 image to

[driessen]

Hi,

I'm trying to install ESXi on my new server, but I get this error during the installation:

"Unable to find supported device to write the vmware esxi 4.1.0 image to"

I think all my hardware is supported?

• Asus Z8NR-D12 | 90-MSVCD0-G0UAY00Z
• 2x Intel Xeon E5620 2,4Ghz Boxed | BX80614E5620
• 4x Kingston ValueRAM KVR1333D3D4R9SK3/12G | KVR1333D3D4R9SK3/12G
• Adaptec ACK-I-mSASx4-SAS4x1-FO-0.5M 
• Adaptec RAID 6405 Kit | 2271100-R
• 4x Seagate Cheetah 15K.7 ST3600057SS | ST3600057SS

The 4 Cheetah drives are in raid-0 and there are 2 ~1tb drives.

How can I fix this?

Thanks!

[a_p_]

There are usually 2 reasons for the error message you see.The first is an unsupported RAID controller (see http://www.vmware.com/go/hcl) or the disk drives/logical volume exceed the 2 TB minus 512 bytes size limit.

André

[driessen]

I see that this controller is not officially supported, I only checked Adaptecs website (how stupid)...

Now I have doubts if it supports ESXi. The adaptec website tells: "supports VMware ESX Classic 4.x (vsphere)". So it should work on ESX. Does that mean it will also work on ESXi?

I've found drivers on the Adaptec website:

http://www.adaptec.com/en-us/speed/raid/aac/linux/aacraid_vmware_esx_drivers_1_1_7-28000_tgz.htm

edit:

http://ask.adaptec.com/scripts/adaptec_tic.cfg/php.exe/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=17086&p_created=1...

Damn, I guess I'm screwed, Right?

[a_p_]

After a quick search I found http://downloads.vmware.com/d/details/dt_esx41_pmc_aacraid_11728000/ZEB3YnR0aipiZCpqcA==

What you could try - to see whether this driver works - is to install ESXi on an e.g. an USB thumb drive (1GB is enough) and then install the driver (instructions included in the download)

André

[Nikhil_Patwa]

I found a similar problem in one of the HP ML370 servers where by I was not able to load the ESXi 4.1 image and hence not complete the installation, came to find out the problem was with the CD/DVD ROM that was not compatible or I don't know what but after replacing the HP CD/DVD ROM was able to install ESXi 4.1

Nikhil

[driessen]

I've just ordered the Adaptec 5805 controller.

Too bad VMware does not support the new Adaptec controllers (yet)...