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Sirex
Asked: 2011-10-12 01:18:27 +0800 CST

vmware install on raid, no logical drive seen

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Trying to install vmware esxi 5 on a fujitsu S100R5 server (two drive bays).

I have the drives as a hardware RAID 1 array, but vmware is showing the two physical drives at install time.

If i install to one of those drives, the array becomes degraded, and at boot time "no operating system" is displayed, even after rebuild.

As i understand it (this is my first bare metal vmware install) vmware is meant to display the logical array as a drive, and you should install upon this.

I'm kind of out of ideas, has anyone else experienced this ?

virtualization installation raid boot

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    The S100R5 does have what is called a "fake-RAID" - it is not the same kind as the "proper hardware-RAID" controller where you would see a complete abstraction of your RAID containers / volumes. Instead, fake-RAID relies on operating system drivers to do the work needed for drive synchronization and eventual checksumming. VMWare's drivers will not support this.

    You could set up your controller for the use of individual drives instead and install ESXi on one of those or buy a hardware RAID controller, preferably one listed in VMWare's Hardware Compatibility List.

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