ESXi-5 - Invalid Boot Drive

[gcoleman]

Hello,

I was able to install the latest ESXi5 onto a system. The install went fine, found the drive, created the partitions and so forth. At the end of the install it states to remove the cd and reboot, which went fine.

Upon reboot, it always states Invalid Boot Drive and there is only a DVD-RW drive (no media) and a 320gig WD Sata drive. This is on a newer Intel socket 775 board (Older style socket, the MB was created less than a year ago, from Intel).

Any ideas? The BIOS drive setting was set to Legacy as well as Enchanced, neither choce seemed to make a difference.

[john23]

-How many virtual disk are created on sata drive using raid controller?

- check the boot order.

[gcoleman]

There is no raid controller, just the straight SATA controllers on the motherboard. Using a single disk too.

Did try the boot order, DVDVRW 1st, SATA second, then reveresed that, still ESX won't boot.

[dhabbetichandra]

Check  If you have any option to run SATA drive in IDE mode(It should avail as you mentioned its one year old Intel). If you have that option change it to IDE mode and try to boot, if this not solves your problem. Install Esxi in IDE mode again.This may help you.Please post your results.

[continuum]

Hi
I would use a USB-stick for booting the ESXi and then use the whole local disk as a Datastore.
If that is no option  boot into Knoppix - wipe the disk blank and try again.

[gcoleman]

I will try the IDE and USB stick suggestions a bit later today or early tomorrow. One questions about the USB stick, what is a good size to use? I have a 2gig and a 4gig but if those are too small I will pick up larger ones.

Thanks for the help folks.

[ScottBerger · Accepted solution]

Are you certain the build out of the hardware is fully supported on the HCL?

-Scott

[gcoleman]

Not 100% sure, but odd that the install see's the drive and installs just fine, so I would assume the drive is recognisable. One thing I can also try is that I have several Dell Perc 5i (LSI Megaraid) RAID cards that are on the HCL, at least with version ESX4. So, if it is a drive controller issue I will revert to that as in the past that has always worked, but I am trying to avoid dedicating a RAID card to these units for my lab.

[gcoleman]

Update and solution here:

Tried the USB stick, 8 gig, ESX 5 saw the stick and installed. After a reboot, the system did POST, but then just a flashing white underscore icon flashing, nothing.

So that made me realize that the error had changed from the previous SATA controller drive and I knew it must be a controller issue.

Here is how weird it is, and referencing the HCL will save you the headache.

ESXi5 DOES see the onboard SATA controller, can install to the drive that is connected. Upon reboot, Disk Boot Failure.

If I attached that same disk to my 3WARE discreet PCI RAID card, and set RAID or no raid, ESXi 5 does NOT see the drive.

So, if I take the drive, connect it to the onboard SATA controller, install ESXi5, then shutdown, connect that same drive to the 3WARE card, ESX works fine.

Seems odd that ESX can see a drive, install to it but not boot and also the reverse, cannot see the drive on a controller but can boot off it if installed elsewhere! So weird.

Thanks for all the help folks, but the messages you can get may confuse users out there and hopefully this thread will help those in a similar situation.