Create a Bootable USB Flash Drive to Install vSphere Hypervisor 5.0

First off credit for this post has to go to Brian Lyttle for his 4.1 USB blog post.

Not to much has changed from the 4.1 methods of booting the install for vSphere 4.1.

The method I used to follow was Ivo Beerans manual syslinux method. This works ok if you manage to follow every instruction perfectly. But in a attempt to make my life easier I found this method is much more straight forward and is easily repeatable.

By using UNbootin to create the USB file, life become much simpler. It still creates a syslinux.cfg file but it does all the hard work for you.

I’m a Windows desktop guy so UNbootin is great for my Windows 7 desktop but its also available for Linux and MAC OS.

Here’s the auto configured syslinux file contents:

default menu.c32
prompt 0
menu title UNetbootin
timeout 100

label unetbootindefault
menu label Default
kernel /ubnkern
append initrd=/ubninit -c boot.cfg

label ubnentry0
menu label ESXi-5.0.0-381646-standard ^Installer
kernel /MBOOT.C32
append initrd=/ubninit -c boot.cfg

label ubnentry1
menu label ^Boot from local disk
kernel /ubnkern
append initrd=/ubninit

Create the bootable USB Flash installation drive.

Download UNbootin from sourceforge.

Once you have stated UNbooin.exe select Ubuntu from the distribution dropdown menu (I left the version at the default).

Select the ISO file you want to be able to boot to.

If an overwrite messages appear just accept them.

Dont click ‘reboot now’

THATS IT… you now have a bootable USB Flash Drive with vSphere Hypervisor 5.0 instiller package.

Ivo’s Kickstart files can be used to automate the instillation of the hypervisor should you wish to do so.

 

To complete the instillation and configuration follow……………