Do you have a S5000PAL or a S5000PSL ROMB motherboard?. I have a S5000PSLROMB and made similar bad experience when I tried to use it with ESX 3.0.x. http://communities.vmware.com/message/5905...
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Do you have a S5000PAL or a S5000PSL ROMB motherboard?. I have a S5000PSLROMB and made similar bad experience when I tried to use it with ESX 3.0.x. http://communities.vmware.com/message/590583 With ESX 3.0.x I had to purchase a RAID activation key (AXXRAK18E), memory for the RAID card, and I also purchased a battery backup unit (AXXRSBBU3). This was quite expensive. I assume you do not need the ROMB version with ESX 3.5 because I believe you now can use the onboard SATA controller. http://communities.vmware.com/message/820550#820550