ESXi SAN Install / Boot (HP BL460c Gen9)

[Yves]

Hi Guys,

I am lost once again... And I actually dont know where else I should ask. Since I know that that here are a lot a Server Admins / Enthusiasts / Freaks (like me) / Homelab Geniuses and Professionals. I hope I find someone who can point me in the right direction.

I run a HP BC C7000 with a few BL460c as Homelab and Certification / Learning Enviroment. My normal lab servers are Gen7 but lately I achived get my hands on a very good deal with a Gen9 which has a total different interface for iSCSI etc.

On my Gen7 I press CTRL+S and set the IP and Target name and set everything to boot and I can run my PXE ESXi custom image and everything is fine.

On the Gen9 even with reading the iSCSI Cookbook from HP back and forth I can not seam to get it to show up in the ESXi installation wizzard. I see it connection to my SAN and I see it staying connected during the start of the installation but around 50% of the ESXi Setup booting up it loggs off...

Any ideas what I could try? Or what I am doing wrong?

Thanks for your help guys

Yves

 

[morner]

are you able to patch all the firmware to latest version?

 

[Yves]

@morner first of all, thank you for your response. You where right I was not on the newest firmware on the HP FlexFabric 10Gb 2-port 536FLB adapter. I updated the firmware to the newest firmware which is 7.15.97. I resetted all the settings to default also the bios settings. And resetup everything. I on the storage logs I see the server connecting .... staying connected... and always at the same time. When the ESXi setup loads the vmkibft module (with the yellow screen) it logs out of the storage... and I don't see the LUNs later. I did some testing now with Win2k16 setup and it shows up just fine.

Any other suggestions?

 

[morner]

are you on the latest version of vmware? weird that the nic drops off... can you see the progress of the install logs? did something crash? when you say it logs out, did it send a logout command or did it just disconnect?

 

[Yves]

are you on the latest version of vmware? weird that the nic drops off... can you see the progress of the install logs? did something crash? when you say it logs out, did it send a logout command or did it just disconnect?

Yes, its with the latest custom iso from HP. FW also the latest. Serval times set everything to factory default re-setup everything... Not ah chance. It loggs of. No crash. But what I found out is that there are dependent iSCSI Adapters and independent iSCSI Adapters from HP for that Blade System. The 536FLB is a dependent one. With a Broadcom Chip. Which as far as I can see or tell even doh according to documentation it should be possible is not able to iSCSI boot VMware. Its able to boot Windows, some RHEL but in VMware to even get it working if you did not boot from it u need to assigna vswitch and vmk to this adapter so it has an IP and knows where the targets are. So the solution now was to ditch the 536FLB for a 650FLB (with an emulex chip) I orderd it 2 days ago yesturday and guess what iSCSI boot works without an issue.


Sent from my mobile

 

[Evan]

Arhhh yes anything Emulex usually just works from my experience
FCoE also.

Boot of SAN and network is always something that has to be checked carefully to ensure correct operation but once working you never want to go back to local boot !

 

[morner]

Yes, its with the latest custom iso from HP. FW also the latest. Serval times set everything to factory default re-setup everything... Not ah chance. It loggs of. No crash. But what I found out is that there are dependent iSCSI Adapters and independent iSCSI Adapters from HP for that Blade System. The 536FLB is a dependent one. With a Broadcom Chip. Which as far as I can see or tell even doh according to documentation it should be possible is not able to iSCSI boot VMware. Its able to boot Windows, some RHEL but in VMware to even get it working if you did not boot from it u need to assigna vswitch and vmk to this adapter so it has an IP and knows where the targets are. So the solution now was to ditch the 536FLB for a 650FLB (with an emulex chip) I orderd it 2 days ago yesturday and guess what iSCSI boot works without an issue.


Sent from my mobile

kind of odd the issue only manifested itself by using a differet processor