ESATA Setup

[chadj]

Setup: VMWare ESX Server 3.5.0, 82663 - I believe it is Update 1.

Server: Dell PowerEdge 2950

All Hard drive bays are full. (Setup as a raid array)

Using one SATA port on the motherboard directly connected to a 500GB hard drive, to do this, we actually have the case top removed.

There are 2 Sata ports on the motherboard, currently only the one being used is enabled.

This hard drive is recognized by VMWare as:

Identification:storage2

Device:vmhba1:0:0:1

File System:VMFS 3.31

There are virtuals installed on this drive, and everything is working fine.

Trying to hook up an ESATA.

ESata device is an NexStar 3

Hard Drive is a Western Digital WD1002FBYS 7200RPM (Server, 24x7 Operation, SATA2 32MB Cache)

I shut down the server and hooked everything up.

Booted into the BIOS and enabled the new Sata port.

I believe the hard drive in the external case is unformatted.

Turned on the external device and booted up the server.

Everything looked like it was booting up fine, but VMWare locked at a certain point, and would not move passed it.

The Line that it was locked at was:

Loading VMKernal ata_piix.o

I reset the server and just unhooked the drive and tried to boot again, it locked at the same place.

Rebooted the server again, went into the BIOS and disabled the Sata port, and the server booted.

Any ideas?

Thanks

Chad

[RParker]

Well it would appear that your hardware is not supported.

Have you tried contacting support?

[chadj]

I have not contacted support yet, I was hoping to get help here first.

[Josh26]

I would be suprised if that hardware is on the HCL.

If it is not, you may be out of luck. VMWare really went with the "server grade hardware" for ESX.

[chadj]

So you are saying that the NexStar 3 may not be supported?

Where is this list of supported hardware? Specifically what is supported for an external hard drive enclosure that will work for what I am trying to do.

Thanks

[Josh26]

Hi,

The HCL can be queried here:

http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/search.php

I got no hits for Nexstar, so it doesn't look like anything they produce is covered.

Realistically I'd be suprised if there was any option available, eSATA isn't something you typically running enterprise data, which is generally the decider on whether a device was included in the HCL. It's certainly well discussed that there are no USB devices supported for example.

[asatoran]

Compatibility guides can be found here.

As for external SATA storage, an eSATA connector attached to a SATA controller will allow use pretty much any eSATA drive. In your case, the fact that ESX didn't boot with the onboard SATA controller enabled means the issue is with your SATA controller, not the external drive or eSATA connector.

That said, when using a eSATA connector with a standard SATA controller, often what you don't get is the ability to hot-swap. If you don't intend to remove the drive, obviously, this is not an issue for you.

One last thing to consider is that many "consumer grade" drives have permanent power managment settings that you can't control. Or power management is through software, which likely won't run on ESX. So your drive may spin down and ESX may have errors finding the datastore. My point is that eSATA might not be the solution for you unless you're getting "enterprise grade" equipment. In which case, you may want to look at other types of direct attached storage (DAS) or even a NAS or SAN.