ESXi 6.5 on Mac Mini 7.1 - No datastores

[kmorehouse0]

I‘m new to setting up ESXi in a long time, and am setting v6.5u1 up on my Mac Mini.

I installed  a 1tb USB drive, and the install seems to have gone fine, without any issues. After booting up, though, I don’t have any datastores created.

Looking at the Web UI, I see three partitions.

1: EFI System - 249 MB

2: Basic Data - 2.5 GB

3: Basic Data - 928.13 GB

However, the partition diagram shows the 928.13 GB partition as free space.

The link to create a new data store is greyed out, and the table is empty under the data stored tab.

I have searched for quite awhile, without any real success finding anything that helps me out.

Hopefully, someone here has gone through this install, and might be able to help guide me on narrowing down a fix.

TIA

[daphnissov]

ESXi will not create a datastore by default on a flash-based device. And you really wouldn't want that since the performance is going to be horrible. Install an internal drive to be your datastore if you must, and put ESXi on a 16 GB flash drive connected to the Mini.

[kmorehouse0]

Thanks for the info.

Is there a way to use a partition of the internal drive for the datastores? Or does it have to wipe the entire drive?

I’ll keep up my research, but any tips, tricks, or advice is appreciated.

[daphnissov · Accepted solution]

Use the entirety of an internal disk for your VMFS datastore. I don't have that model of Mini, but this is what I did in my lab using an earlier model. When you install ESXi, provided the driver is present, it should present that disk device and allow you to format it as VMFS.

[kmorehouse0]

Thank you. That is what I figured I’d have to do. Was just avoiding having to clear the internal drive. Just a little more time to back up the current partition.