V3.5 & Microsoft HomeServer

[a18041967]

I have read that people had managed to get beta versions of Homeserver working, but has anyone had any success with ESX 3.5 & the final release of Homeserver? I have tried and failed.

I have created a VM with 65Gb disk, 512Mb RAM & BusLogic controller and the OS set to Windows 2003, if I upload an ISO copy of the Homeserver DVD the install starts and gets to the point where it cannot find a disk to install the OS to, at this point you can provide a driver disk, in this case the VMWare Buslogic drivers, these are read and an error message displayed. This is not specific to the BusLogic drivers, the same error is generated if I use LSI drivers.

If I do exactly the same as above but mount the DVD in the ESX host, the drivers are loaded without errors, but still no harddisk is found.

Any ideas

[zemotard]

Hi, maybe same problem that with windows XP, search in the download section, you will find a disk driver to install by pressing F6 during windows installation.

Regards

[a18041967]

I'm getting to the point where I can specifiy additional drivers ( the Windows XP F6 option ) but when using an ISO file and error is generated, if I use the physical DVD no harddisks are found.

[Dave_Mishchenko]

The install may be looking for certified drivers. Have you tried it with the buslogic floppy image? - http://download3.vmware.com/software/vmscsi-1.2.0.4.flp

[a18041967]

:smileygrin: Ok, I have solved my problems but it was not easy, in summary neither ESX or Workstation will allow you to install the final release of WHS, it appears that the installer is very very fussy. In the end the only way to install WHS was to use Microsoft's Virtual Server product, once the install had completed I used VMWare Converter to migrate the image. I did this in two stages. First I migrated to VMWare Workstation and then from Workstation to ESX. It now appears to be working OK, I had to adjust the memory allocated from 384Mb to 512Mb, install VMWare tools and uninstall VMWare converter agent.

[Dave_Mishchenko]

I was able to try it tonight. I created a VM on ESX with 66 GB drive and was able to get around the hard drive prompt by adding LSI W2K3 drivers from the below link. I created the VM as Windows 2008 with an Intel e1000 card. Having gone through the install, I would have picked Windows 2003 server but changed the NIC to the Intel card anyways.

[jgswinkels]

Hi,

It is also possible to use the Buslogic SCSI driver, downloaded from

Cheers,

Jan

[Dave_Mishchenko]

It should be OK, but I would stick with the LSI controller as you'll get better performance. You'll also want to ensure that the virtual HD is larger than 60 GB for the install to work.

[jgswinkels]

Thanks .. I created a new virtual diskette image and sue now the LIS drivers. Cheers, Jan