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anatoli_atanaso
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Running driver e1000e on esx 3.5 update2

Dear Experts,

I am trying the 60 days trial of ESX 3.5 to my home PC. It runs on Intel DQ35JOE motherboard that has Intel® 82566DM Gigabit Ethernet Controller integrated. Now I am trying to configure this nic up & running. I have installed the e1000e driver that supports that nic. Everything went well with the installation, but when I opened the VI console the adapters was NOT visible. I can see the adapter as eth0 after invoking the command ifconfig eth0 . My questions is how can I make this interface visible to the ESX server so I can start use it for VM communication over the network.

Thanks in advance!

Anatoli

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wpatton
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Sadly, this is probably a result of the chipset and not the NIC itself. Only certain PCI IDs are supported. I would recommend any of the Intel PRO 1000 GT cards, and ESX will fully support these.

They go for about $30 or so at Newegg.

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weinstein5
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Welcome to the forums - When you say you installed the driver - where did you obtain it? VMware has written the o/s (vmkernel) and it will be vmware who will need to supply the driver - or are you trying to get the e1000 card running in the vm? If you are you will need to make sure vmware tools is installed and you will have to modify the VMX file by inserting the line -

ethernet0.VirtualDev = "e1000"

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wpatton
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Sadly, this is probably a result of the chipset and not the NIC itself. Only certain PCI IDs are supported. I would recommend any of the Intel PRO 1000 GT cards, and ESX will fully support these.

They go for about $30 or so at Newegg.

If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".

*Disclaimer: VMware Employee* If you found this or other information useful, please consider awarding points for "Correct" or "Helpful".
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anatoli_atanaso
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Hi there,

Thanks for the quick reply. I've downloaded the e1000e driver from sourcefourge.net. I managed to compile it and after that the NIC can be used (to ping, to open ssh sessions, etc.), but the device is not visible to the VI console - Configuration > Network Adapters.

Regards,

Anatoli

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weinstein5
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You have to understand there are two components going on here - your have the service console where you installed the e1000 driver which actually is a virtual machine - you also have the vmkernel the operating system for your esx host - this is where the appropriate network drive needs to be installed - but I am curious do your have other NICs installed in your ESX Hosts - becasue if you are able to connect with the VI Client networking is functioning and there should be no need to install a driver - can post a screen shot from the VI Client => Configuration = Network Adapters? And from the command line post the output esxcfg-nics -l

thanks this will better help us understand what is going on -

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anatoli_atanaso
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On my esx host I have installed two network controllers: one dual port Intel 82571EB Gigabit Ethernet Controller (PCI Express slot) and Intel 82566DM Gigabit Ethernet Controller (integrated on the mainboard). To enable the second controller I had to install the e1000e driver that is not shipped with VMWare ESX Server. After the installation of the driver I can use the adapter to connect over the network. The problem comes when I try to view the adapter through the VI console to start creating Virtual Switches and so on. The result after issuing the esxcfg-nics -l is:

Name PCI Driver Link Speed Duplex MTU Description

vmnic0 01:00.00 e1000 Up 100Mbps Full 1500 Intel Corporation 82571EB Gigabit Ethernet Controller

vmnic1 01:00.01 e1000 Up 100Mbps Full 1500 Intel Corporation 82571EB Gigabit Ethernet Controller

The second adapter is not listed here, but still I can use it to ping some other machines over the network. My question is how can add the second adapter to that list. After that I suspect that the adapter will be viewable on the VI console.

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weinstein5
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I did not see the Intel 82566DM NIC in the HCL - http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi35_io_guide.pdf - in fact there is a driver built in for VMware to support the e1000 NIC so I am betting it will be as wpatton indicated the probelem is not with hardware but the driver only supporting certain chipsets - since it is not showing up in the esxcfg-nics command it is not available for use in your ESX host - to check functionality are you just doing a ping command from the service console? What do the commands esxcfg-vswif -l and esxcfg-vswitch -l show -

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anatoli_atanaso
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Yes, I know that the pointed NIC is not supported by ESX Server. But still I thought I could install it anyway.

The result of esxcfg-vswif -l is:

Name Port Group IP Address Netmask Broadcast Enabled DHCP

vswif0 Service Console 192.168.1.2 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.255 true false

The result of esxcfg-vswitch -l is:

Switch Name Num Ports Used Ports Configured Ports MTU Uplinks

vSwitch0 64 4 64 1500 vmnic0

PortGroup Name VLAN ID Used Ports Uplinks

Service Console 0 1 vmnic0

Switch Name Num Ports Used Ports Configured Ports MTU Uplinks

vSwitch1 64 3 64 1500 vmnic1

PortGroup Name VLAN ID Used Ports Uplinks

Windows 2003 R2 0 0 vmnic1

RHEL 5 MW 0 0 vmnic1

SLES 10 Oracle DB 0 0 vmnic1

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weinstein5
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As I indicated vmware us responsible for the drivers thar run under the vmkernel and this NIC is not supported - with what you printed out the traffic is going over the service console port on vSwitch0 -

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anatoli_atanaso
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Is there any way to install other drivers in the vmkernel, so to add the second NIC. I did manage to compile and install the e1000e driver in the kernel and now I see it as eth0. Can I compile the source for the vmkernel, because when I try to load the compiled modue in the vmkernel the results says that the module is not compiled for vmkernel and must be compiled as such.

Anatoli

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weinstein5
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I believe there is a way you can create a driver through the SDK but it will not be supported - but remember where you installed your drive is in the service console which is virtual machine running running a modified version of RHEL 3 under your ESX server - not into the vmkernel

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ricatsymhro
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can you point me to this sdk?

in particular i am trying to compile a new e1000.o based on version 8.x of the driver which should give me 82566DM-2 support

thanks in advance!

ric

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anatoli_atanaso
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Ric,

Recently I have found the source code of that library (actually the e1000e driver) and compiled against the linux beneath the ESX. If you want I could send it to you (I downloaded it from sourceforge).

Regards,

Anatoli

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mraufer
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Anatoli,

if you compiled an e1000e driver against ESX, would that also run on ESXi (3.5 update 3)? Can you send it to me, and how could I get it to run? Those Intel board NICs are quite a challenge for anything but Windows OS. Thanks.

Max.

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