First some background, and our general problem.
And the problems we ran into and have overcome in
the past few days. Perhaps you will suggest better solutions
than the ones we discovered.
At the end we will get to the specific questions we are
struggling with at the moment.
We have been using the free VMware Server for a while.
One of our customers has just purchase their first ESX Server Standard
license. They are starting to build the box to run it this evening.
We have a 30-day demo ESX license we are using on an old Dell
workstation. Dual 2GHz Xeon processors. 2 GB ram, 2 SCSI
controllers and a couple SCSI drives.
Our general problem is that the standard configurations
disscussed in the documentation are large installations,
with lots of ESX servers. And lots of MS Windows boxes
(Puking Sound Effects) to manage them. We have only
one ESX server license, no Virtural Center license.
And would really prefer to manage the server through
the web interface and/or ssh sessions. We intende to
use the Virtual Infrastructure Client as a last resort.
We spent the past couple days struggling with bad SCSI drives,
bent pins, ... When we tried installing ESX server with two SCSI
drives on separate controllers. We wanted to try mirroring in a
way that a controller failure would only affect one side of the mirror.
But when ESX server would try to boot it would get a GRUB Error 22.
Anyway we ran away from that problem for now and unplugged one
of the drives reinstalled ESX and now it boots. I'm assuming it won't
be too difficult to add the second drive later. But we have other
hurdles to overcome first.
Discovered the web interface requires a plugin. Need a VM to
install the plugin. Can't get around it, we had to use the Virtual Infrastructure
Client to create a VM. Ok now we have a VM. Can't start it till we figure
out how to install the ESX Server License. While my partner is struggling
with that issue I attempt to install a linux Firefox plugin. I can see the
VM from the Web. Go to the Console, Click on Intall Plugin. Then click
on Install Now. Looking good. No Joy. "Firefox could not install the file
at https://.../vmware-mks.xpi because: Cancelled". Maybe it's unhappy because
we haven't got the license key in yet.
Found lots of stuff about license server ... But we don't even have a
Virtual Center license and can't go that way even if we wanted to.
Finally figured out how to do a Host Based License Install. Still get the
same error when we try to install the Firefox Plugin. Any ideas on how
to overcome that problem?
Trying to install a client OS. Put a OS install DVD in the ESX Server.
Try installing from the stupid Windows Virtual Center CD. Can't coax
the server to load from it's DVD drive. Maybe they want to install across
the network from the Windoze box. Don't have a DVD drive in that laptop.
If we get a .iso file on the Windoze laptop's hard drive can we install from
there? In the morning I going to drive a couple hundred miles north.
Install W2K in a VM on a free VMware Severbox with a DVD drive and
try installing a client OS from a VirtualCenter Client running there. There
ought to be a reasonable way to get this up and running without a
crummy Windoze box.
Later,
Drew
