Hello everyone,
Recently I thought of utilizing a spare system to set up my small Visualization lab at my home. It is a Core2Duo System 3 GHz with 4gig RAM and 1 TB HDD.
Huh, the moment I tried to install ESXi 5.5 from the boot disk, the installation halted saying “No compatible network card detected” and bla bla…. It was really a sad moment seeing that on my first hypervisor installation.
Oh by the way, I was using PCI NICs which were:
1. DLink 528T – gigabit NIC
2. RTL8139DL – 10/100 mbps NIC
Now this is what I did to make these two work.
- Download the following .vib files (according to your needs):
a. Realtek R8168
b. Realtek R8169
c. Realtek R8139
d. Realtek R8168
e. DLink 528T - Download the ESXi customizer tool : ESXi customizer
- Now you can install the above files in any two ways.
Pre install (Using the ESXi customizer tool)
Post install (Using SSH Console)
First Method (Using the ESXi customizer tool):
This method is quite self explanatory. Still if u face any problem feel free post your query in the comments section.
Second Method (Using the SSH Console):
This is where I use my favorite tool : Putty
- Enable SSH for ESXi 5.5 -> Configuration > Security Profiles > Properties > SSH > Options > Start and stop with host > Start
- After enabling SSH, we login to the console using putty. The username and password is same as that of the vsphere client.
- We then copy the .vib file to the datastore location. In my case the name of the datastore is datastore1.
- Then we issue the following command :
esxcli software vib install -v /vmfs/volumes/datastore1/8139.vib - Here 8139.vib is the file name of the driver.
- After some time, it will give u a installation successful message.
- Then restart the server.
- Now you can see the NIC listed in your server.
