Installing VMware ESXi 4.0 on Dell 1950: Cannot open vmkboot.gz

Posted by rlandster on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by rlandster
Published on 2010-02-16T17:17:23Z Indexed on 2010/04/17 21:03 UTC
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vmware-esxi

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installation

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dell-poweredge

I am trying to install VMware ESXi 4.0.0 U1 on a Dell 1950 server via a bootable CD-ROM. I keep getting this error right at the start:

Cannot open vmkboot.gz

I checked that the CD-ROM drive is not to blame by installing Debian Etch using that drive. I tried several different versions of ESXi (3.5, 3.5 Dell edition, 4.0 Dell edition) and they all give me an error at the same place. I also tried installing from a USB "thumb" drive but got the same error.

I checked with the VMware HCL (Hardware Compatibility List) and the Dell 1950 is listed as being compatible.

Here are some server details:

Two 1.6 GHz Xeon 5110 CPUs (ID: 06-0F-B)
BIOS version 2.2.6

Any ideas on what might be the issue?

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