With VMware vSphere 6.5 released recently, I decided to rebuild my Intel NUC based homelab. My preferred method is to create a bootable USB drive with the ESXi install media on it. Then install from the ESXi USB to the dedicated NUC’s boot USB. This method avoids non-unique ESXi installs, which is a common issue with the VMware Workstation pre-install method.
In order to create our Intel NUC specific ESXi install media, we need to gather the necessary files. Make sure to grab the newest versions of the following:
First, let’s create a project directory for our files. Let’s call it C:\esxi-nuc .
Copy the ESXi 6.5 offline bundle ZIP file (ex. VMware-ESXi-6.5.0-4564106-depot.zip ) and the ESXi-Customizer-PS script (ex. ESXi-Customizer-PS-v2.4.ps1 ) to this directory.
Create a sub-directory under our project directory to hold our VIBs. Let’s get creative and call it C:\esxi-nuc\vibs .
Copy the SATA AHCI driver VIB (ex. sata-xahci-1.38-1.x86_64.vib ) and the USB 3.0 Ethernet driver VIB (ex. vghetto-ax88179-esxi65.vib ) to this sub-directory.
If you’ve copied all the files to their respective folders properly, it should look something like this:
Now we have to run the ESXi-Customizer-PS script to pull everything together and generate an ISO file. So fire up PowerShell, navigate to our project directory which is “C:\esxi-nuc” in our example, and run the following command:
Make sure to use the version numbers that match your downloaded files. Also, don’t forget the “-nsc” flag, as that will let us ignore the unsigned driver VIBs and continue.
If everything went as planned, you should now have a new ISO file in the project directory that is an ESXi 6.5 and VIBs combination.
Now that we have our customized ISO, we need to turn it into a bootable USB and then install it on our NUCs. We’ll do just that in part two.
In the first post, we created an ISO image of VMware ESXi 6.5 to install on our Intel NUC. Now we turn that ISO into a bootable USB and do the install.
We’re going to use an application called Rufus to create our bootable USB, so download and install it. Now start Rufus.
First, make sure that your to select your target USB flash drive in the Device drop down menu. Then, change the “Create a bootable disk using” drop down menu to “ISO Image” (call-out 1). Then click the image selection button (call-out 2) to find and open our customized ISO (ex. ESXi-6.5.0-4564106-standard-customized.iso ).
You should now see an updated new volume label which matches the ISO image you chose. Click the Start button to begin building the bootable USB (call-out 3).
A warning may pop up about an older version of the ‘menu.c32’ file. This file is part of Syslinux and helps make the ISO/USB bootable. If we don’t replace the older version of the file then our USB won’t boot properly, so click Yes (call-out 4).
Rufus will remind you, forcefully, that you’re about to wipe out all the data on the target USB drive. You backed up anything on the flash drive that you wanted to keep, right? If you’re sure you’re ready to continue, click OK (call-out 5).
The bootable USB will now be built by Rufus. Rufus basically does a bit of work to make the USB drive bootable, and then extracts the contents of the ISO file to it.
When finished, you’ll see that the device name has changed at the top, the green progress bar is full, and the status reads “READY”. Click the Close button to exit out of Rufus (call-out 6).
Now you can eject your USB drive as it’s ready for use as a vSphere ESXi installation drive.
If you’ve installed ESXi before, this should be really straight forward, and I won’t bother with all the details. Essentially you need to make sure to connect your Intel NUC to a monitor and keyboard, and that the drive that you want to install ESXi into is either installed or plugged in. Remember that in my home lab example, that I’ll be installing ESXi on a USB drive. This means that both the USB drive that we’ve built to install ESXi from and the USB drive that we’ll be installing ESXi to have to be plugged into the NUC.
As a reminder, F10 will allow you to select your boot device on the Intel NUC.
In order to get the USB Ethernet adapter to work, we need to enable the ESXi Shell, login, and run the following command:
Then log out of the shell, disable it again and reboot the host.
Now that we have successfully installed ESXi 6.5 onto our NUC, we can begin to do some fun and interesting things. Like, say, install ESXi on some more NUCs and then create a vSAN cluster. Stay tuned.
I came across the same problem on a bay-trail based system. I had to do the following:
1) set BIOS "max cpuid value limit" to disable
2) Redirect the Direct Console to a Serial Port by Setting the Boot Options Manually
- At startup press Shift+O and append the following boot options
"gdbPort=none logPort=none tty2Port=com1";
3) connect a null modem cable from the esxi host pc to another pc. This will allow you to finish the install and see further messages if there are more issues.
4) after installation completes, boot up the host and repeat steps 3 and 4 (if the screen continues to show the "relocating modules" mesg)
- the relocating modules message has something with ESXI not liking the video card. Anyways, this just means you won't be able to use the local display to manage ESXI but you can still use vshpere client to manage the system remotely.
5) setup your management ip and launch the vsphere client to manage your new esxi host.
Hope this helps. Good luck!
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esxi 6.5
I successfully installed VMware ESXi 6.5 on my NUC5PPYH (Intel Pentium N3700, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD) using these steps on Windows 10:
Since the system is lacking support for the Braswell graphic chip you wont see anything on the screen happening besides that last line "Relocating modules and starting up the kernel...".
Just ignore it. :smileycool:
Please note that the ks.cfg script will erase all contents of the drive inside the NUC!
----<snip>----
# ks.cfg: scripted installation file for ESXi 6.5 installation
# Accept the VMware End User License Agreement
vmaccepteula
# Set the root password for the DCUI and Tech Support Mode
rootpw mypassword
# Install on the first local disk available on machine
clearpart --firstdisk --overwritevmfs
install --firstdisk=local --overwritevmfs
# Set the network to DHCP on the first network adapter
network --bootproto=dhcp
# reboots the host after the scripted installation is completed
reboot
# enable SSH and the ESXi shell
%firstboot --interpreter=busybox
vim-cmd hostsvc/enable_ssh
vim-cmd hostsvc/start_ssh
vim-cmd hostsvc/enable_esx_shell
vim-cmd hostsvc/start_esx_shell
----<snap>----
**************************************
This description Worked for me on my Intel NUC5PPYH
But I made a minor change in the ks.cfg:
# Set the network to DHCP on the first network adapter
network --bootproto=dhcp --device=vmnic0
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Another formula
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I had to try several times until I got it working:
THIS IS A GUIDE TO INSTALL ESXI FROM - AND INSTALL ONTO THE SAME - USB-STICK
1.) BIOS: reset to default ! and DISABLE UEFI boot - leave only legacy usb (if you leave uefi the shift+o commands will be ignored)
2.) Remove ANY HDD/SSD/WHATEVER from the NUC - you will add it again later
3.) Make the aforementioned boot stick from rhoenies post.
4.) Make a ks.cfg file on the stick with the following content
----<snip>----
vmaccepteula
rootpw whatever
network --bootproto=dhcp
clearpart --firstdisk --overwritevmfs
install --firstdisk --overwritevmfs --novmfsondisk
reboot
----<snap>----
5.) Plug the stick into your NUC and press Shift+O at the ESXI bootloader
6.) Type: >runweasel ks=usb:/ks.cfg ignoreHeadless=TRUE and press Enter
7.) ESXi will now be installed (takes about 15 Minutes) - then the machine will reboot
8.) After reboot your NUC will complain: "no disk found" - reboot and enter BIOS
9.) Enable UEFI boot and check the box at "Boot usb disk first". Check "suppress alert messages" too.
11.) Save bios and shutdown -> Now you can reinstall your HDD/SSD
12.) Remove the stick from your NUC, plug it into you computer and make following change inside BOOT.CFG: "kernelopt= installerDiskDumpSlotSize=2560 no-auto-partition ignoreHeadless=TRUE"
13.) Now plug your stick back in and enjoy your fully working ESXi host by just acccessing it over https://IP-ADDRESS/ui
14.) After trying every bios option possible I gave up: you can't run a NUC5PPYH without a monitor or a vga dummy connected. So if you plan on running your NUC complete headless I recommend ordering a 5$ hdmi dummy.
If you encounter Problems it is usually related to your USB-Stick. You can try this:
>runweasel ks=usb:/ks.cfg ignoreHeadless=TRUE preferVmklinux=TRUE
But if it doesn't help try a different USB-Stick. I recommend not to use a USB 3.0 capable one.
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