Question about installing ESXi4

[jados1ms]

Is there anything special that needs to be done when install ESXi 4 on a system that is using an Areca card? The person that is trying to install the OS says it gets to a point that then says it can't see a hard drive.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[Virtuali3ed]

First check ESXi HCL to find out if your card is supported as from the descirption that you have given it looks like esxi may not have the drivers for your card.

Secondly check the card vendor's website if they have any drivers for esx availble on their site.

[asatoran]

Is the card on the compatibilty list? ESX is picky about it's hard drive controller and NIC.

[DSTAVERT]

There are several cards that don't support booting in ESX(i). They work for the datastore once ESXi is installed on another device. You can try installing ESXi directly to a USB stick 1GB or larger. This is a supported install directly from the install medium.

[Jackobli]

Areca is now supported, but only some models (officially).

You have to download the driver cd and use it during install.

As written, you may also install to an USB stick and load the driver after the installation to use the ARC-based RAID for storing the VM only.