I simply selected the HPE Custom Image ISO and then clicked OK. To Extract the ISO I used UNetbootin which allows you to create a bootable USB Drive. I use the Disk Utility on my Mac and erased a 8GB SanDisk USB stick using the MS-DOS (FAT) format and the Master Boot Record Scheme.
Today I am using a HPE DL160 Gen9 server so I downloaded the HPE Custom Image for VMware ESXi 6.0 U2 Install CD.įormatting a new USB/SD is straightforward, it may take a little longer if you have a stubborn partition that you cannot delete. Many people aren’t aware that vendors such as Dell, HPE, IBM, and others provide a custom image that includes the necessary drivers. Note: This time is based on an HPE ProLiant DL160 Gen9 Server with 1 Intel Xeon E5-2609 v4 CPU and 128 GB of memory.Īlthough this seems like a simple task, it is common to download the wrong. So why does everyone say “About 5-minutes?” my guess is that they are likely referring to the amount of time the spent completing the installation screens. The installation of a single ESXi host actually takes approximately 20-minutes, assuming no mistakes are made. Reboot ESXi – Host is Ready with DHCP Lease Here is a breakdown of the actual installation time for a single server:įormat USB/SD storage media – Extract ISO In fact, I recently had to install ESXi on a rack of 24-servers and I when I informed the customer that the installation of ESXi alone would take approximately 8-hours – they responded “I thought it only took 5-minutes to install ESXi?” Although the installation of ESXi is extremely fast, 5-minutes per server is really stretching the truth. If you ask most VMware Administrators how long it takes to install vSphere ESXi 6 the most common response is, “About 5-minutes”.