Dell T3500 w/ ESX 4 Nightmare...

[choinga]

I have a couple Dell T3500's that I'm trying to get ESX on for a lab buildout. Supposedly, they work but it ain't happenin' for me...

Right now I'm hung up during the install. I bypass installing custom drivers and then the next screen dies saying ESX can't find my Broadcomm NetXtreme 57xx driver. So, I downloaded the custom driver CD ISO for ESX 4 from here: http://www.vmware.com/support/vsphere4/doc/drivercd/esx40-net-bnx2x_400.1.48.107-1.0.4.html

I've made both a CD and a DVD using two different pieces of software to burn the ISO and no matter what I do, at the custom drivers 'add' screen it will not detect that CD/DVD as a custom driver CD. It just keeps popping the message saying that what I have in there is not a custom driver CD.

What on earth is the problem here. It seems like everytime I want to install VMWare on something I end up with some weird driver issue...this one is a first for me...

Thanks in advance!

[AndreTheGiant]

There is a HCL for VMware ESX/ESXi.

Unfortunally if you use "unsupported" hardware you can have this kind of problem.

Andre

[choinga]

definitely NOT helpful, sir.

The Broadcomm IS supported...there's a custom install CD with drivers that I just posted a link to.

The issue is during the install process when you can add custom drivers even when I supply the CD, ESX doesn't 'recognize' it for some reason.

[glynnd1 · Accepted solution]

I believe Andre was referring to the T3500.

There are a some good sources out there who would be able to guide you on what the root issue is, and possible how to work around it, I would start at http://www.vm-help.com//esx40i/esx40_whitebox_HCL.php

Good luck.

[choinga]

Thank you - I've seen that site.

As I mentioned, I don't think the problem is with the T3500 itself, in fact others have got the T3400 to work which is very similar to my box: http://communities.vmware.com/thread/158378?start=0&tstart=0

My issue is with the dang custom install CD. I can't get the ESX installer to recognize it for whatever reason and that's what I'm trying to figure out. The reason the installer dies if I don't use it is because it says it can't find a network controller...so I download the ISO image for the Broadcomm drivers, make a CD out of it and go through the motions, but ESX keeps telling me it's not a custom driver CD...WTF??

[glynnd1]

The driver you link to is for the Broadcom NetXtreme II BCM57710, BCM57711, BCM57711E 10/100/1000/2500/10000 Mbps PCI express Ethernet network controllers, which I believe are all 10gig network cards. While the T3500 has the Broadcom 5761 Gigabit Ethernet controller, a very different nic.

The thread you link to has the T3400 and ESX3i. While I'm not certain on the difference between the T3400 and T3500, I do know there are great difference between 3i and 4i.

I would suggest grabbing a nic that is known to work with ESXi, like the Intel Pro/1000 GT as linked to earlier which can be had for $35. That way you can verify if the rest of the hardware will work with ESX4i.

Finally, are you sure you are burning the CD correctly, what do you see on it? Also did you do an MD% checksum on the ISO you downloaded to verify that it wasn't corrupted?

[AnatolyVilchins]

Dell T3500, just like any other Dell that is not a PowerEdge server, is not in VMware HCL for ESX.

</div>

Starwind Software Developer

www.starwindsoftware.com

[tiru321]

I think your issue is not related to driver cd/burning. I feel you are removing cd manually by pressing the button on your pc. When it ask for Custom drivers, just select "Yes" and click "Add..." button, it will automatically eject the VM CD and insert your driver CD and check. Hope this will help you.

Tiru