![]() The other way (recommended) to get drivers is to use the HCL. You can find the driver files on the website of the vendor (Intel, Broadcom…) where you will usually find the “ Async ” drivers (developed by the vendor, e.g. Sometimes you won’t even get any support from VMware until you have updated your firmware and drivers as it is the first thing they check. Sometimes you will not want to install the latest version of the driver on purpose because it has been found to be the cause of issues. Just like with a Windows OS, those depend on the hardware, the major version of the OS and the firmware version in use. The rule of thumb, however, is to always install a driver version that is in the VMware HCL (Hardware Compatibility List). In this blog, we won’t get into the dirty details of which version of a driver to use as this could be the topic of a blog in itself. You will quickly realize that there are many tools for the same job. If you install a depot using ESXCLI you will install all the packages in it. Once the depot is added in VUM, you can pick some or all of the packages that are in it to create a baseline. ![]() Offline : ZIP files that can be imported in VUM or installed in one batch on a host.The main VMware depots are preconfigured in vSphere Update Manager but the largest tech vendors also offer public depots that contain their certified drivers and extensions. ![]() ![]() Online : Accessible with an HTTP URL that can be public or internal.Software depotsĪ software depot is simply a location where VIBs and image profiles are stored and hierarchically organized, just like a Red Hat repository that contains all sorts of RPM files. Image profiles are usually used by vendors to distribute custom or OEM ISOs of ESXi including the correct and supported drivers for the hardware installed in their servers. PowerCLI includes “image builder” cmdlets to create your own ISO with specific VIBs. Image profilesĪn image profile is an ESXi image that contains a collection of VIBs. The acceptance level is set at the host level and shows the amount of certification of that VIB by VMware ( VMwareCertified, VMwareAccepted, PartnerSupported, CommunitySupported ).īelow is a screenshot of a VIB file for a 10Gbps network card driver (ixgben) where you can see the 3 files.Īlthough it is not directly related to what we are doing, I think it will be useful to cover these 2 terms to better understand the overall concept and what’s to come in the next chapters.Īs we mentioned previously, a VIB is a small file that contains one driver or a piece of software to expand ESXi’s capabilities, which makes it the smaller entity. Signature file (sig.pkcs7) : Specifies the acceptance level of the package.Descriptor file (descriptor.xml) : Contains metadata information about the package like dependencies, requirements, compatibility, whether or not maintenance mode or reboot is required….File Archive : Contains the actual files to be installed on the system (driver, patch or extension).Third-Party companies propose their own packages to extend the capabilities of vSphere in order to support their own solution or optimize the interactions between them.Ī VIB is made up of 3 different components: VSphere Installation Bundles don’t necessarily come from VMware. It is not to be confused with a Patch which is a collection of VIBs. Its purpose is to simplify the distribution and installation of drivers, patches and third-party extension modules. It is comparable to an RPM for Red-Hat systems or even an APK for Android. VIB is a term that comes up quite a lot in the VMware world, but what is it exactly?Ī “ vSphere Installation Bundle ” is a package, or archive, that contains the necessary files to install the payload on a vSphere host. We will also demonstrate how to install and update packages, where to find them, how to know which one to use… vSphere Installation Bundle In this blog, we will describe what these packages look like for vSphere hosts and how to interact with them. Running hosts with outdated or unsupported Firmware and Driver combinations can lead to incredibly unstable systems which in turn will cause all sorts of headaches like PSOD, IO devices disconnecting randomly, you name it… Ensuring supported and up to date packages is actually the first step VMware support engineers take when responding to a Support Request (SR). Enforcing a supported configuration and up to date infrastructure comes with the task of managing drivers, patches and software extensions on the hosts. They need to ensure that they are working according to the baselines and provide the best possible SLA. ![]() A great number of responsibilities belong to vSphere administrators in a datacenter team as the hosts are one of the foundation stones for all the other systems. ![]()
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