NIC Passthrough ESXi 6.5 Free Version

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sapper6fd

Member
May 21, 2013
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Is NIC passthrough available on the free version of ESXi 6.5? I've gone through the documents an everything on NIC passthrough, I assume, seems to refer to the paid version. The options to do this seem to either be missing or grayed out in the vSphere web client.
 

BlueFox

Legendary Member Spam Hunter Extraordinaire
Oct 26, 2015
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Does your system support VT-d? If not, well, you're kinda out of luck. At least on 5.5, NICs are not really treated any differently for passthrough. You can enable passthrough on just about any PCIe device without having licensing.
 

Tom5051

Active Member
Jan 18, 2017
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Check your bios to make sure VTd is turned on. Pretty much all motherboards support it now, it's just a matter of getting the passed through device to actually work in the VM, some devices just won't work.
 

vhypervisor

New Member
Jan 19, 2017
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Hello, ive tested it on HP DL380 G7 with esxi 6,5 i cant passthrough my graphics Card (Rx 460 Core) But on esxi 6,0 i can passthrough it.


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sapper6fd

Member
May 21, 2013
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For this system, it certainly should. E5410. The Intel specs page for it says it supports VT-x. I'll need to check in the BIOS to ensure its enabled - thats a good point. I'm almost positive it is.
 

whitey

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Jun 30, 2014
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VT-x and VT-d are two VERY different things so ensure your system/s supports whatever function you are after, VT-d in this case I believe is what you need.
 

BlueFox

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Oct 26, 2015
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For this system, it certainly should. E5410. The Intel specs page for it says it supports VT-x. I'll need to check in the BIOS to ensure its enabled - thats a good point. I'm almost positive it is.
The Xeon E5410 is a 10 year old CPU and doesn't support VT-d. That wasn't introduced until the next generation. You're pretty much out of luck.
 

Aestr

Well-Known Member
Oct 22, 2014
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Seattle
I'm pretty sure that generation needed the motherboard to provide vt-d. I recall my X7DWN+ supporting passthrough after a BIOS update with an E5420. A quick search of the supermicro FAQs agrees, so check the specs on your motherboard.

To be more clear, motherboard support was less common in that generation and it appears CPU support is unlisted in ARK. YMMV.


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maze

Active Member
Apr 27, 2013
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Passthrough doesnt work with the web client on the host directly in 6.5. Get the old C# client and go through that.. should work then.
 

RyC

Active Member
Oct 17, 2013
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Well the C# client won't connect to 6.5 hosts at all. And you can manage passthrough/add passthrough devices just fine in the 6.5 web client. When editing a VM, it's under "Add other device".
 

zer0sum

Well-Known Member
Mar 8, 2013
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Passthrough doesnt work with the web client on the host directly in 6.5. Get the old C# client and go through that.. should work then.
Is this your personal experience, or a known issue?

As mentioned the Vsphere client won't connect to 6.5 hosts any more, and even on a 6.0 host it can only edit virtual machine hardware features that are hardware version 8 and earlier
 

maze

Active Member
Apr 27, 2013
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It Will connect - i have it connected at the moment.

But yes, HW version has to be 10 or lower iirc.

And yes, its a known issue. Alternatively you need a vcenter to run the flash based client. To do the passthrough