VMware ESXi – Fatal out of memory reading…

During a recent VMware ESXi 4.0 deployment I experienced an error while installing:

“VMware fatal out of memory reading”

This occurred around ~4 minutes into the installation process whilst image.tgz was being loaded.

The server in question was a Dell PowerEdge 860, 2 x 500 GB RAID 1 and 2 GB of DDR2 memory. I went ahead and increased the RAM to 4 GB and started a re-install, same problem. I identified that the server was running BIOS version A03. I proceeded in a BIOS upgrade to A05 and RAID controller firmware then initiated a re-install. ESXi installed successfully.

It appears the problems pertain the memory handling and the VMware hypervisor installation process. Bottom line, upgrade your BIOS and RAID controller firmware before doing an ESXi install. Its also a good idea to check out the VMware Hardware Compatibility List (HCL) located here.

VMware ESXi – Enable SSH

SSH access is not enabled, by default, in VMwae ESXi 4.

To enable SSH:

  1. Go to the ESXi console and press alt+F1, note: you will need to do this on your physical server.
  2. Type: unsupported, press enter.
  3. Enter the root password, press enter.
  4. At the prompt type: “vi /etc/inetd.conf”
  5. Look for the line that starts with “#ssh” (you can search with pressing “/”)
  6. Remove the “#” (press the “x” if the cursor is on the character)
  7. Save “/etc/inetd.conf” by typing “:wq!”
  8. Restart your ESXi server: reboot

Note: If your trying to find the location of your virtual machines do a global find using: #find . -name ‘*.vmdk’