USB as a Main Storage device
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@art_of_shred said:
Or, maybe it's just not supported.
I guess I'm lost on what you are trying to do, exactly?
Are you trying to use a USB drive as a datastore for ESXi? or some other hypervisor?
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@Dashrender said:
@art_of_shred said:
Or, maybe it's just not supported.
I guess I'm lost on what you are trying to do, exactly?
Are you trying to use a USB drive as a datastore for ESXi? or some other hypervisor?
Exactly.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
@art_of_shred said:
Or, maybe it's just not supported.
I guess I'm lost on what you are trying to do, exactly?
Are you trying to use a USB drive as a datastore for ESXi? or some other hypervisor?
Exactly.
I don't think it's possible. I think you can use an external HDD like that, but not a flash drive.
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What's the problem? Does ESXi not see the drive as a place you could put a VMDK?
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It's to host a Xen Server, correct?
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@Dashrender said:
What's the problem? Does ESXi not see the drive as a place you could put a VMDK?
Well, XenServer specifically tells me that Virtual Drives aren't enabled when I attempt to install to it. IT sees the USB just fine.
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Hmmm... so, maybe it's not supported?
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How hard would it be to just get a single HD to put the OS on and then use the SAN for the datastores, or whatever Xen uses?
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@Mike-Ralston said:
Well, XenServer specifically tells me that Virtual Drives aren't enabled when I attempt to install to it. IT sees the USB just fine.
Oh, this is new information. It is XenServer telling us this? We've been trying to diagnose the Dell hardware up until now. This might be a XenServer issue.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Mike-Ralston said:
Well, XenServer specifically tells me that Virtual Drives aren't enabled when I attempt to install to it. IT sees the USB just fine.
Oh, this is new information. It is XenServer telling us this? We've been trying to diagnose the Dell hardware up until now. This might be a XenServer issue.
Dell Hardware AND XenServer are telling us this.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Mike-Ralston said:
Well, XenServer specifically tells me that Virtual Drives aren't enabled when I attempt to install to it. IT sees the USB just fine.
Oh, this is new information. It is XenServer telling us this? We've been trying to diagnose the Dell hardware up until now. This might be a XenServer issue.
Give this man a cookie!
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@scottalanmiller XenServer works up until the point of selecting which drive to install on. It then says that Virtual Drives is not enabled, and tells me to go to BIOS to enable it. The Dell AutoInstall in the UEFI, does fine up until you select where to install the media, and it says that Virtual Drives is either not enabled, or not supported.
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I'm lost - what the heck is a virtual drive in this instance? is that what XenServer calls the datastore (ESXi speak)?
What is the Dell AutoInstall in the UEFI? Are you saying there is installer code in the UEFI itself to help you install OSs?
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@Dashrender said:
I'm lost - what the heck is a virtual drive in this instance? is that what XenServer calls the datastore (ESXi speak)?
What is the Dell AutoInstall in the UEFI? Are you saying there is installer code in the UEFI itself to help you install OSs?
Yeah, that is catching me too. I have no idea what that term is supposed to mean here. It is not a useful term and isn't the right technical term for what is going on. It's not what XenServer calls a datastore, that would just be a datastore. It's a reference to something odd.
And I wasn't aware of this AutoInstaller product either. Not sure what that does.
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I think that the next step is trying this with a normal desktop first. Get that working then take the USB stick to the server. Just do the install as if you were going to do it on the server, on a desktop.
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Considering that UEFI is a full out OS just embedded in the hardware, I wouldn't be surprised if it could/did/does include Dell's OS install media to make it easier to install all the drivers, etc.
But I still don't know what it means by Virtual Drive.
