trying to install OS on vmware server

[tomdlgns7]

i vmware esxi 4.0 installed on a server and i have vsphere installed on a physical PC running win xp pro.

i have successfully connected to the vmware machine with vsphere and i created a new virtual server...well, started to.

i have the server 2008 cd that i want to install from, but i cant get it to boot into the CD.

i assume the server 2008 cd goes in the vmserver itself (not the xp machine i am connected with vsphere).

yes, i have already booted the virtual server and went into the bios and selected the cd rom drive as the first boot device.

yes, the server 2008 cd is a proper boot cd.

what am i missing?

thanks.

[Troy_Clavell · Accepted solution]

you have the box checked for the CD/DVD drive to "connect at power on" ?

[tomdlgns7]

ok, i got it...found another user asking the same question

answer....

Use checkbox "connect at startup" in VM's edit setting

of course i had to turn off the virtual server in vsphere and select the cd/dvd drive to run off of the host machine.

[golddiggie]

Do yourself a favor and upload OS install ISO files to a datastore the ESX server has a connection to. Every VMware Admin that I know (myself included) has an ISO Library on one of the ESX/ESXi datastores. We keep ALL OS installer ISO files there to enabled rapid installation of a new OS. Once you create a few VM's from scratch, you'll want to explore using templates too. I've used that for Windows Server 2003 as well as CentOS 5.x. Generally speaking you're looking at creating a new server from template in 5-15 minutes (depending on the speed of your server and storage). Using ISO files WILL be faster than using physical discs to create your VM's too. I typically see it take anywhere from 1/4 less to half the time to get to the same point using ISO files compared to spinning media.

VCP4

[tomdlgns7]

thanks for the suggestion. i see this is the common thing to do. i have never used vmware and i just have it installed on a test box right now to try it out. what you said makes alot of sense. i will try this next.

however, i do have a question about the store location. where can i store the ISO files so that they are accessible to me when i want to install from an image?

thanks.

[tomdlgns7]

i just read your post again.

i dont have a datastore, well, i dont think i do.

i have a 500gb drive that i threw into a spare box i had and installed VM onto that.

is it too late to create a data store partition on that?

again, this is just a test box, not in a real environment.

thanks.

[golddiggie]

You'll have at least one VMFS datastore after installing ESX/ESXi onto the system/box. You should see if under the datastore list when you look at the host Summary tab from the vSphere client. Just create a new directory within that datastore for the ISO files to reside in. Then, when you go to create a new VM and want to install the OS that is in that ISO file, you just point to that file instead of an actual disc. The option is in the cd/dvd drive settings section, under "Device Type" where you can select either "Client Device", "Host Device" or "Datastore ISO File" with a browse button there. Makes it very eary to pick which ISO to use to install the OS from. I've never actually used physical media to install the OS onto a VM, since one of the early steps I go through when setting up the ESX/ESXi host is to create the ISO library. I also include any software installers that are normally on cd/dvd into the ISO library to make it that much faster/easier to install onto VM's. Since you can usually either download the OS installers as an ISO file right from the developer/manufacturer, or create ISO files off of physical media fairly easily, it's never been an issue to me. Plus the reduction in how long it actually takes to install when using the ISO file makes it all worth it.

VCP4

[tomdlgns7]

thanks, i will check this out next time i turn on the vmware machine.

(test box is in my basement)

thanks again.