ESX scripted install problems (recognised memory)
Hello!
I am trying to get a scripted install of ESX 3.5 working, however, I have hit a very annoying issue that I have not been able to get past so far.
I am using an edited sample script from "VMware VI3 Jobs ->VI 3.0 Deployment -> Scripted Install of VI 3.0". I am using DOS as the preboot environment for each script, mainly because the scripts themselves are DOS scripts.
This all works perfectly, and it writes down the FAT32.img and then executes the scripts perfectly, however, as soon as the ESX install proper starts (so the actually ESX GUI starts), I see an error from ESX stating that there is not enough memory and a minimum of 284Mb is required. Now these servers have 16Gb of Physical memory. I have assumed it is some sort of DOS memory allocation issue, but I have no way of knowing how to get round it.
Can anyone help? Pleeeassse!
Cheers
Ian
ESX 3.5
Check https://www-secure.symantec.com/community/article/...
This only works on when DS is installed in Windows 2003 and you have IIS and FTP enabled.
Make sure the kickstart file that comes with the job has the right info for the memory part.
Nelson
Thanks for your advise
Thanks for your advise Nelson. I have gone through the article you mention and made the changes, the ftp site is working perfectly.
However, I get the exact same issue. In fact I noticed on this attempt something new, as I was watching the console more closely and at one point I spotted an output to the console (it flies past on the console, so I was lucky to spot it), and it stated that there is num_physpages=1024. Now I did a bit of looking into this and I believe that num_physpages in the linux world (this is of course what esx is based on), is the total physical memory seen. Therefore, as 1 page equals 4kb (depending on the kernel setting, but the default is 4kb), then we are seeing 4096Kb (i.e 4Mb) as the total physical memory of the box…….a little under the actual value of 16Gb! :)
This seems to be the issue that we are having, so when the linux install is kicked off within the dos preboot it only sees 4Mb of phys mem for some reason. However, if I was to install (from the exact same cd archive) ESX 3.5 manually, then it sees the whole 16gb. Therefore, in my head, it must be something to do with the dos preboot only giving us a small amount of memory.
I have a support case open for this one as well, which I am waiting for advice on, I will update in here when I know more, but if you or anyone else can offer some assistance in the mean time then that would be perfect?
Kind Regards
Ian
Hello All, I found out that
Hello All,
I found out that what this comes down to is that a scripted OS install of ESX is actually not supported yet in the product. The scripts provided may or may not work, until the full support comes in, which will be 7.1+ time-zone.
The imaging of ESX servers is fully supported, but then you have the issue of wiping the network config with a script, or utility, I will be looking into this now.
Hope this helps someone.
Cheers
Ian
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