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Gregtrea
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

IBM x3550 Booting virtual machine booting from CD Rom

I have an IBM xSeries 3550 and am trying to install SuSE Linux 10 SP1. I've followed the instructions on booting the VM from cdrom

1) Edit boot options delay

2) Attach cd/dvd

3) set boot device to cd/dvd

4) boot VM

The VM won't boot from the DVD going right into pxe boot. The DVD is bootable on the physical machine. What am I missing? Or is there a way within ESXi hypervisor to validate it can read the drive?

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weinstein5
Immortal
Immortal

Welcome to the Forums - First thing I would check is on the machine options for the dvd/cd-rom is to make sure it is enabled to connect at power on -

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Gregtrea
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Can you explain further about the CD/DVD is enabled to connect at power on? The drive is available to the physical hardware at power on. Is this an option within ESXi?

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weinstein5
Immortal
Immortal

This is an option in the settings for the virtual machine's virtual hardware -

1 Click the Hardware tab.

2 Click the DVD/CD-ROM drive in the Hardware list.

3 Make changes as needed to the device status, connection, or virtual device node for the virtual machine to use.

4 For the CD-ROM drive connected when the virtual machine starts, select Connect at power on.

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Gregtrea
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

This is what my CD-Rom hardware properties looks like. Connect at Power on is grayed out..

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Gregtrea
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Thanks for your help. I added another CD device but pointed it to Host instead of Client and that solved the issue.. Your Connect at Power On pointer triggered my discovery..

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car377
Contributor
Contributor

It didn't help me a bit. My IBM x3550 loaded RHEL 4 Update 5 just fine from the CDROM before I ever tried putting any VMWare software on it. I've pretty much wrecked my Saturday morning loading the free ESXi and trying to get my first Virtual Machine to boot from the RHEL4 Update 5 installation CD, trying every possible combination of client vs. host device, connect at startup, manual connect with forced delay, add second drive pointed at host instead of client, modifying the boot order in BIOS setup, etc., etc., but when I power the VM up, the console shows the VM jumping straight to network boot and ends up at "Operating System Not Found" no matter what I do. BTW, the documentation is terrible, pointing to non-existent links and non-existent tutorials, skipping over critical procedures, using inconsistent terminology for the same thing (e.g., "product key" vs. "serial number"), circular pointers on the website (thank heaven Firefox detects those and stops). This stuff could really be fun with decent documentation or web help, but the way it is now, it's just misery.

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Dave_Mishchenko
Immortal
Immortal

One thing that will help with the BIOS speed is to set a delay. Bring up the settings for the VM select the Options tab and then advanced\boot options. I usually set the delay between 5000 and 10000 to get a 5 to 10 second delay in the BIOS.

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car377
Contributor
Contributor

Thanks for the response. I've tried that - everything from 1 second to the full 10 seconds, with both host and client drive configurations - no luck.

Chuck

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car377
Contributor
Contributor

Finally got the VM to boot the RHEL 4 Update 5 installer by transferring the .iso for the boot CD into the VM's datastore and pointing the CD option there instead of at a virtual or host drive. That was only possible because a happened onto your article about enabling SSH and restarting inetd. At the rate that ESXi upgrades are gutting what's left of the console, I suspect the capability to transfer iso images into the datastore using SSH will vanish with update 4 or 5.

Looks like the x3550 is actually not supported by ESXi, according to the HCL. I read "ESX" and thought that meant "ESXi" as well, but when I look at the Dell 1950 entries in the HCL, I see that "ESXi" is called out explicitly, at least for some processor versions of the 1950. "ESXi" doesn't appear at all for the x3550.

I know that being a newbie is always difficult, but figuring out how to do even simple things with the ESXi facilities and interfaces is like pulling teeth. I'd like to make another VM using the VM I finally got built and configured, but I don't know if that's even possible using only the VI client and the host. Also, my datastore shrank from 130GB down to 8.95GB, and I can't figure out how to delete old stuff to free up space without blowing up the stuff I want to keep. The help system is great as long as you already know exactly what you want to do and how you want to do it, meaning it's largely useless for newbies.

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car377
Contributor
Contributor

Thanks for your previous help, but please don't bother to respond to my last two postings. I've used up all the time I can spare for ESXi in a futile search for a mythical document called the "VMware Infrastructure Tutorial" that is referenced in numerous VMWare documents (e.g., page 29 of the ESX 3i Getting Started Guide) and on numerous VMWare web pages, but which does not appear to actually exist. The "Tutorial" link on the "Help" drop-down in the VI Client is greyed out, and the "Explore Further" link on the "Getting Started" tab (and which only appears on the host "Getting Started" tab, BTW) points to a webpage full of links that result in dead-end snipe hunts and circular references.

Good luck with the ESXi giveaway. Results will likely improve if someone cleans up the documentation and webpage mess.

Chuck

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