Looking For Ideas On Server Software Architecture

ESXi free is an iso file that you can download from VMware (ok, suppose their website designer was formerly at HP and formerly at IBM, simply producing chaos everywhere......). If you still have a CD/DVD drive (or external USB), you can simply burn the iso to a CDR and boot

Rufus is a tool to use an iso to create a bootable USB stick from it
https://rufus.ie/

Last time that I have tried NextCloud, I have simply deployed the .ova in ESXi
(but avoid NextCloud now in favour of Amazon S3 compatible sharing of a ZFS filesystem, much faster and simpler directly in OmniOS)

see https://www.hanssonit.se/nextcloud-vm/
 
Did you ever get going on this? Regardless of which route you take, there will be some learning in installing and running either proxmox or esxi. I haven't started down the proxmox path, but Ido use the esxi free version for home and higher end vsphere paid version for the advanced features. there are lots of articles and youtube videos for both you will have to take some time to read up and figure out what you're doing.


So to go the ESXI route:
Make sure the hardware you got is compatible since I didn't see exactly what you got, you want to make sure you get a supported version of ESXI for your hardware since you're just starting out.
you can install ESXI and run VMs from hard drive, or install ESXI to a small USB drive or hard drive and keep your VMs on a separate hard drive. Having your VMs on a separate hard drive makes it easier to upgrade ESXI later.
Download free ESXI 6.5/6.7 (Version 7 just came out, I'd suggest going with ESXI 6.x version since theres more documentation and experienced people to help out)
Setup USB drive to install: https://vmarena.com/how-to-create-bootable-vsphere-6-7-installer-usb-flash-drive/
If you have an issue, try running it again using rufus.
Install ESXI to drive of choice and run through teh install wizard. Reboot as needed
Remember the password you pick
Once it comes up you can login locally and verify it's on the network and got a DHCP IP address. I recommend setting a static ip address.

Then you can access the management oage by opening up the ip in a chrome browser and logging in.

I recommend going to the datastore and creating an ISO folder and uploading your OS install ISOs to that. When you install a new OS from the ISO, you can point the CD drive to the ISO and then instal lfrom there.
From there you can install a new VM from an OVA file or create a new VM and install an OS from scratch.
 
Bookmage said:
Did you ever get going on this? Regardless of which route you take, there will be some learning in installing and running either proxmox or esxi. I haven't started down the proxmox path, but Ido use the esxi free version for home and higher end vsphere paid version for the advanced features. there are lots of articles and youtube videos for both you will have to take some time to read up and figure out what you're doing.


So to go the ESXI route:
Make sure the hardware you got is compatible since I didn't see exactly what you got, you want to make sure you get a supported version of ESXI for your hardware since you're just starting out.
you can install ESXI and run VMs from hard drive, or install ESXI to a small USB drive or hard drive and keep your VMs on a separate hard drive. Having your VMs on a separate hard drive makes it easier to upgrade ESXI later.
Download free ESXI 6.5/6.7 (Version 7 just came out, I'd suggest going with ESXI 6.x version since theres more documentation and experienced people to help out)
Setup USB drive to install: https://vmarena.com/how-to-create-bootable-vsphere-6-7-installer-usb-flash-drive/
If you have an issue, try running it again using rufus.
Install ESXI to drive of choice and run through teh install wizard. Reboot as needed
Remember the password you pick
Once it comes up you can login locally and verify it's on the network and got a DHCP IP address. I recommend setting a static ip address.

Then you can access the management oage by opening up the ip in a chrome browser and logging in.

I recommend going to the datastore and creating an ISO folder and uploading your OS install ISOs to that. When you install a new OS from the ISO, you can point the CD drive to the ISO and then instal lfrom there.
From there you can install a new VM from an OVA file or create a new VM and install an OS from scratch.
Click to expand...


I did finally get ESXi 6.5 (7 didn't work with my older hardware) installed. This project has taken the back seat for a few weeks while I got my garden up and running but now I'm back at it. Over the past few days I've watched a lot of videos and read a lot of guides. Right now I'm trying to figure out how to use my second SSD as a datastore. When I try to create one it doesn't show up but I know that the controller sees it because it shows the disk when the card boots.

Question: How does one get .iso images onto the ESXi machine? Can I use a USB drive? I ask because I forgot the password for my current file server so I can't access the files over the network. This was really the final impetus to make this machine a reality that I've know has been coming for some years now.
 
S-F said:
Yeah, I just got a second SSD for VMs. Server hardware has been rolling in to my house like a herd of turtles. Shipping is apparently overtaxed these days. I also have all of my RAM installed (64 GB) and 8 x 8 TB HDDs so I'm ready to go.

I had already seen that guide. It seems like a bit of work. Is it worth it? Going through all that to run an .ova when it's native to VMWare? At the moment I'm putting my NextCloud .ova on a USB drive to try to load on Proxmox.


Also the SSD I installed Proxmox on is only something like 80 GB and the install took almost all of it so trying to utilize the remainder for VM storage is kinda pointless.


EDIT:
That guide doesn't specify how to target the location of the .ova. The initial command to unzip it fails. Please be gentle with me here guys. I'm a complete Nix N00b but I do need to learn this stuff for when I ditch Windows 7 in the near future.
Click to expand...
This is why I installed a minimal Ubuntu install and then just run a few docker containers. I have a 120gb SSD and have over 100GB for storage.
 
S-F said:
Question: How does one get .iso images onto the ESXi machine? Can I use a USB drive? I ask because I forgot the password for my current file server so I can't access the files over the network. This was really the final impetus to make this machine a reality that I've know has been coming for some years now.
Click to expand...

Select storage in the ESXi webinterface. The ESXi databrowser allows then a direct upload from your desktop to your datastore ex to an iso folder. When you create a VM, select the iso file as source for your virtual cd/dvd drive.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top