Is there any way to network install ESXi 3.5 installable?

[amaltemara]

With version ESX 3.5, you can install ESX over the network using NFS / PXE and a kickstart.cfg file.

Is there any way of installing ESXi 3.5 installable over the network?

Thanks in advance,

-Anthony Altemara

[weinstein5]

not really - because the ESXi is actually preloaded onto you physical hardware so there is nothing to install form the network -

[Jasemccarty]

You are referring to the "installable" version I assume.

Jase McCarty

http://www.jasemccarty.com

Co-Author of VMware ESX Essentials in the Virtual Data Center

(ISBN:1420070274) from Auerbach

[amaltemara]

yes, I am referring to the "installable" version...

[Jasemccarty]

I'd start by looking at deployment of the BusyBox Linux distro.

You may find some success there.

Jase McCarty

http://www.jasemccarty.com

Co-Author of VMware ESX Essentials in the Virtual Data Center

(ISBN:1420070274) from Auerbach

[amaltemara]

Thanks for the suggestion.

In looking up busybox, it looks like it's just a drop-in replacement for various system commands, but not a "distro" per se. Doesn't include any way to boot or install a functioning system...

[fejf]

Hi,

I think this should be possible BUT you need some experience with Linux and I'd suggest about a week of time. A concept that might work:

The esx3i-installable.iso includes a tar.gz file with the esx3i hard-disk image (around 750mb). The easy part would be to setup a dhcp/tftp/nfs-server to create a network-bootable linux environment. After booting a script could use the hd-image and write it on the futer esx-server-hd.

The difficult part after that is that you need to configure all the stuff that the installer would. You can use the installer-script from the iso and modify it - but this still takes some time and linux-knowledge...

--

There are 10 types of people. Those who understand binary and the rest. And those who understand gray-code.

[Dave_Mishchenko · Accepted solution]

The PXE install for ESXi is fairyl straight forward to setup. See the instructions I have here - http://www.vm-help.com/esx/esx3i/ESXi_PXE_install.html.

The harder part is customizing the system after the install. Currently the options I have seen

1) run post install scripts with the RCLI - but the command set of the RCLI doesn't currently match what you would have with the 3.5 vimsh / esxcfg-*

2) if you're dealing with the same types of servers, you could use vicfg-cfgbackup to force the restore of a pre-configured image.

In the realm of the unsupported you could

1) build a post install script to run at the console - many of the esxcfg-* commands do exist on the system.

2) you could hack the install process and run some python scripts during the install. Basically the ESX install process loads up ESXi and then uses scripts to install the disk image that's found in the install.tgz file. If you extract that file, you'll see the files that they use for the install.

[amaltemara]

Thanks! This was the answer I was looking for. We have a pxe server we use to install ESX 3.5, and this fit in perfectly. I've tested it today and gotten it working.

Thanks!

-Anthony

[dp_tn]

Can you post the details of your work? We are looking for a similar solution and would like to automate deployment of fully configured ESXi "appliances".

[AdStar]

Could you please give details on how you achived this.

Long story short, havea remote server, need to PXE boot it, then install ESXi on the machine.

(can't use IPMI due to ESXi resyncing the USB bus during install and dropping the CD image).

BUT my biggest issue is it's local 3Ware card. If I could PXE boot, I could use a hacked oem.tgz with the 3ware drive to then allow me to format/setup the 3ware drive and then install ESXi to it.

Please please please give us details on how you have done it?

Cheers

Adam

[Dave_Mishchenko]

Do you have an existing PXE server and have you looked at the link above?

[AdStar]

Yup I have the machine booting off PXE fine, and loading up ESXi

I'm about to hack the oem.tgz up with the 3ware drivers...

I guess from there I'm a little green on what commands I acutally use to format the local 3Ware RAID and "install" ESXi on the RAID.. thats the bit I'm not 100% sure on how to do.

Do I just do a "USB" like install but to the 3Ware RAID?

Is everything I need loaded in the ESXi PXE boot?

Cheers

Ad

[Dave_Mishchenko]

Personally I would install ESXi to a USB drive and boot from it. Then you can modify oem.tgz to recognize the 3Ware controller. You will need to create you RAID arrays on the controller before you install EXi and keep in mind that you need to keep the array size below 2 TB.

If you try to install via PXE you'll have to modify the oem.tgz file that is used for the install process, and then boot the host with a Linux live CD to update the copy of oem.tgz that will be installed to the Hypervisor1 partition.

[sreekanth_reddy]

Hi,

I have done the SETUP using http://vm-help.com/esx/esx3i/ESXi_PXE_install.html

But when the server is booting to ESXi installable, it throws an error "/bin/ash: Can't open /sbin/install"

I am using ESXi 3.5 Update 4 Installable edition.

Please help me

Thanks

Sree

[aleksandergafka]

I will response , even that this topic is very old, but it comes in google search, when I had the same problem with ESXi4.1

This can't open sbin/install is caused by inproper amount of "-" in append line. You must have 3 "-" before install.vgz or any other file